With Joe Brady calling plays, here's how O.C. Pete Carmichael fits with the Bills
Pete Carmichael, the Buffalo Bills' new offensive coordinator, will be tasked with keeping the offense on track, but also keeping communication in sync with head coach Joe Brady, who will be calling plays.
Four different times in his introductory press conference, new Buffalo Bills offensive coordinator Pete Carmichael said he was “fired up” about his next chapter. It started with his opening statement.
“All right, I'll just start off by saying I'm excited to be here,” Carmichael said Thursday. “I've waited about seven years to have an opportunity to get back to coaching with Joe Brady, so I'm fired up about that, and I'm ready to get going.”
Carmichael and now Bills head coach Joe Brady first worked together in New Orleans when Brady joined the Saints staff in 2017. Carmichael first joined the franchise in 2006 as quarterbacks coach. For two seasons, Carmichael and Brady worked together to better the offense, until Brady left for an opportunity at Louisiana State University.
“I just love his passion,” Carmichael said of Brady. “He loves the game. He loves to be around it. His ability to communicate to the players, I mean, there's just so much about it, and early on, when we started working together, you could tell right away that there's something special about this guy.”
Bills offensive coordinator Pete Carmichael talks during a press conference at the Bills practice facility on Thursday.
Joshua Bessex, Buffalo News
Carmichael, 54, served as the Saints' offensive coordinator from 2009 to 2023. Working under head coach Sean Payton, Carmichael was involved in making the offensive game plan, but Payton called the plays. Carmichael worked with Payton in a similar manner in Denver for the last two seasons as a senior offensive assistant.
He’ll now find a similar structure in Buffalo. Brady has confirmed that he’ll be calling plays for the Bills' offense. But as Brady has emphasized his desire to be involved with defensive meetings, he will lean on his veteran offensive coordinator.
So, for Carmichael, that means not only keeping the offense on track, but also keeping communication in sync with Brady.
“I think the main thing is, when you talk about things that might come up with the head coach that he's got to deal with, and he's not able to be in the room, that the message that he wants portrayed, whether it's to the coaching staff, the team, whoever, that I'm portraying the exact same message that he would want the players to hear,” Carmichael said, giving examples.
“Maybe, how are we running this route? How are we blocking this scheme? But he wants to make sure that the communication is as if he were in the room saying it.”
In his role as Brady’s OC, Carmichael is “pretty excited” to work with franchise quarterback Josh Allen. Carmichael admitted he was a “good coach” for Hall of Fame quarterback Drew Brees during their time in New Orleans. As he gets to know Allen, which he says will come once Allen is back in the building, Carmichael will be looking for the quarterback’s input on the evolving offense.
“It's got to be something that he loves, and it's got to fit our personnel, as well,” Carmichael said of any new plays. “But if there's something that, ‘Hey, Josh, I got this idea.’ And he's like, ‘Ehhh,' then we don't need it.”
Likewise, Carmichael will draw on past coaching experience with Saints running back Alvin Kamara to inform his work with Bills running back James Cook. For the wide receiving corps, Carmichael is looking for diversity of skill sets, so that the Bills can play to different strengths.
But Carmichael is still getting to know the players. After all, he just flew into Buffalo on Wednesday night. Still, Carmichael’s main draw was getting back together with Brady, this time with more experience under each of their belts. But even when Carmichael first met Brady in 2017, it didn’t take long to see flashes of a future head coach.
The veteran coach recalled a time when Brady accompanied Carmichael, who was headed to speak to the LSU football staff at the request of then-head coach Ed Orgeron. Both thought it would be a small setting, but when it came time for Brady to talk, the room filled up. Carmichael got a view then of how Brady can command a room.
“And when I tell you the whole building was in there, and I was kind of like, ‘Oh, we were just the opening act for this guy, for this rock star,’ ” Carmichael said.
“And I'm telling you, I started taking notes, just listening to him talk and just, I mean, you knew early on that this guy was gonna be pretty good.”