Josh Allen's goal is to spend his entire career with Bills
“I try not to think about the end. I feel like it's still a long ways away, but absolutely,” Buffalo Bills quarterback Josh Allen said. “I don't want to play anywhere else."
Josh Allen has lived a pretty charmed existence over the past year or so.
The Buffalo Bills’ star quarterback has gotten engaged to a Hollywood starlet (Hailee Steinfeld), won the NFL MVP award and, just days ago, was handed a new contract with the most guaranteed money in league history.
None of that is lost on Allen.
“I just think I’m blessed,” he said Wednesday. “Sometimes, it is a little breathtaking, or you can’t find the right words on how to describe it. It’s been a heck of a run. I think the joy I have of playing football is the No. 1 thing that fuels this – of going out there and just putting everything that’s not on the field on the sideline, and then after that I get to enjoy a pretty great life with a great family, a great-to-be, future wife.
Buffalo Bills quarterback Josh Allen is now signed through the 2030 season. Harry Scull Jr./Buffalo News
“I’m just blessed beyond belief. That part is probably the craziest. The support and love that I have from my family, that I’ve always had. None of that has ever changed or wavered. I’m a pretty lucky guy.”
As lucky as Allen is, the Bills are equally as fortunate to have him. That is why they decided to give him a new contract, even though his old one still had four years remaining on it. Allen’s new deal has him signed through 2030, his age-34 season.
Speaking on a video-conference call from Southern California, where he makes his offseason home, Allen was asked if finishing his career playing for only the Bills was a goal.
“I try not to think about the end. I feel like it’s still a long ways away, but absolutely,” he said. “I don’t want to play anywhere else. You know, not too often do players get to stay with one team their entire career, but … this is home to me and it’ll never not be home. Yeah, I’d love to continue to play here as long as I can, and when it’s time to put the cleats up, hopefully it’ll be in Buffalo.”
Allen shared a story that, in hindsight, makes it seem like he was destined to be in Buffalo. On his pre-draft visit, a snowstorm left him unable to get out of town for planned visits with the New York Jets and Giants. A couple Bills scouts took him out to dinner – at Bar Bill, of course.
“It just felt like home to me,” Allen said. “It’s kind of the only thing that I’ve ever known of, you know, small-town feel where the people are great and the food’s just as great. So those were two big factors for me, and not having a huge city of traffic and this and that, that’s something I kind of feared. But I just think it’s home for me.”
Josh Allen, center, is flanked by Alec Anderson, left, and Connor McGovern on Jan. 26 in Kansas City, Mo. Harry Scull Jr., Buffalo News
Allen’s new contract is worth up to $330 million over six years. Obviously, it’s hard to comprehend such an astronomical figure. The reality, though, is that with an ever-rising salary cap, he probably could have gotten more if he wanted. He’s worth every bit of that money and more to the Bills.
“It didn’t seem like from my perspective I was taking a whole lot less, but the way I make sense of it, when you start getting these fairly big numbers throughout the entire league, it’s weird to say this, but what is five (million) more going to do for my life that I can’t already do right now?” Allen said. “It’s not that crazy to me. I live a pretty good life. Got a house, got a car. We’re good. I wasn’t looking to absolutely kill them at every chance I could, and I told my agent that.”
The exact terms of his new deal have not yet been made public, but by negotiating an extension, Allen actually helped the Bills free up salary cap space this season.
“I think (general manager Brandon) Beane and the front office wanted to get something done, as well as my agents. I know I was kind of sitting there just like I understood the impact of getting an extension done, creating some cap space,” Allen said. “I’ve had a big contract before, and it doesn’t really change how I live in my life. But I know that, again, this opens up some space for cap and signing some free agents. I think we’ve been having a pretty good free agent run so far.”
By not pursuing every last dollar, which is an approach Tom Brady took during his extended run with the New England Patriots, Allen gives the front office a bit more to spend at other places, which is for the betterment of the team.
That was top of mind Wednesday for Allen because, for as great as his past year has been, individually, for the team, it ended in familiar, disappointing fashion – with a loss to the Kansas City Chiefs in the playoffs. Finding a way over that hump and to the franchise’s first-ever Super Bowl title needs to be the focus for not just Allen, but everyone at One Bills Drive.
“That’s, really, the only thing I’m thinking about, just trying to continue to get better and find a way to bring a Lombardi trophy to Western New York,” the quarterback said. “That’s why Beane’s kind of doing what he’s doing in the free agency period right now, the guys that he’s brought in, guys that he thinks can help push us over that hump.”
That, of course, starts with Allen, who knows that with any new contract comes a new set of expectations that he not only continues his high level of play, but exceeds it.
“This doesn’t mean I’ve arrived,” he said. “I’ve got to continue to get better and find ways to help this team get over that hump and win a Super Bowl. So that’s what we’re going to continue to try to do.”
