ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. – During the Buffalo Bills’ playoff drought, ESPN anchor Kevin Connors joked on air. Connors, a lifelong Bills fan from Long Island, refers to the Bills as America’s team. That would elicit a laugh from his co-anchors. One had sympathy for Connors, while other fans endured the slog of 6-10 and 7-9 seasons.
But now? Connor looks like he’s on to something.
“They’ve really become America’s team,” Connors said of the Kansas City Chiefs ahead of Buffalo’s latest playoff clash this week.
“America loves its stories. America loves the underdog, but I think they respect a team that has actually been there, been bad forever, built it up, been pretty good, and continues to get up on the mat. There’s a level of respect for that.”
It’s not easy to quantify interest in national roots in any given postseason. Betonline attempts to determine how many posts the official team hashtag comes from each state based on Geotaged data of X posts. Early in the playoffs, their data shows that half of the states in the country are rooting for the Detroit Lions. But the Washington Commander eliminated the Lions last week with his feel-good talk. The remaining NFC team is the Philadelphia Eagles, the team that recently won the Super Bowl. And then there are the Chiefs, who have won two straight Super Bowls and have gone to three of the last four. The Bills are the only team left on the field without a Super Bowl victory.
When Betonline ran the data again after the conference championships began, it showed that two-thirds of the country was pulling the bill. It’s not an exact science, but it makes anecdotal sense.
“People are tired of seeing the same thing. “Maybe that’s why people cheer for us. “They see us as weak.”
Legislation is not David to Goliath. They have been to the playoffs six consecutive times, won a playoff game in five seasons, and have had the last six 13-win seasons. Josh Allen is one of the best quarterbacks in the league and probably the most exciting to watch.
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But this is also a team and fan base that has been kicked repeatedly by The Shins. Forget four straight Super Bowl losses or even the 17-season playoff drought of the 1990s. Throw away the fact that this region, one of the smallest markets in professional sports, has never experienced a Super Bowl or Stanley Cup championship. Even without that history as a backdrop, this version of the bill has built up its own scar tissue. As the bill has become a fixture on nationally televised games in recent years, its lowest moments have been on display for the football-watching public. The football world felt the collective pain of the fan base in Buffalo’s 13-second loss to Kansas City. Home playoff losses in the divisional round to the Cincinnati Bengals the past two seasons have made it easy for people outside of Buffalo to wonder how fans keep coming back.
And considering the non-football adversity the team and community have endured, all that on-field sadness seems minor. In 2022, the country rang around the bill when Damar Hamklin collapsed on the scene and nearly died. That same year, Buffalo endured tragedy when a racist gunman killed 10 people and injured three others at a supermarket on the city’s East Side. The devastating Christmas blizzard killed 47 people in 2022. Too often, Window on the Country in Buffalo centers on struggle.
The Bills have a chance to change that, as they did for three hours on Sunday in a thrilling division round win over the Baltimore Ravens. Over 42 million people turned out to party at Highmark Stadium. Fans who had been in the parking lot since the early morning hours ended the night with a Vintage Buffalo Celebration, first at the stadium and then in the same parking lot.
Earlier that week, a Baltimore radio personality called Buffalo, “the city of losers.” After the game, Bills coach Sean McDermott gritted his teeth as he mentioned this and delivered a passionate defense of his hometown.
“This is a city of winners,” he said. “These people in this city are winners. I’ve only been here 8 years but I consider this my home. This place is different and the people here are different. They are worth more than anyone who spoke about them.”
“Buffalo is a city of winners and the people here are different.” ❤Neelam#gobills | #billsmafia pic.twitter.com/lny6lll70s
– Buffalo Bills (@buffalobills) January 20, 2025
Bills safety Micah Hyde started on the outside this season as he ponders his future. Sitting at home in San Diego gave me a different perspective on just how many people outside of Buffalo are pulling for the bill.
“I think it’s been that way for a while now,” Hyde said. “We’re so close to getting over the hump.”
Hyde also saw this story evolve. He arrived as one of the first signings under Sean McDermott’s tenure as head coach in 2017. He has been through all the highs and lows with this regime. He made his career and his home away from home. And this season, he decided to return as a member of the team’s practice squad to do whatever he can to help this team across the finish line. Hyde’s son likes to watch his dad’s highlight video before he goes to bed. And the video hit home to Hyde just how far the bill has come.
“There were a few highlights from 2017, it was a home game and there was very little in the stands,” Hyde said. “To see the organization from where it was to where it is now is two completely different things and honestly, it’s really cool to see. So I thought coming back would not be easy. I wanted to be a part of this. To be honest, I could see it from when it was a dumpster fire, when we first got here, it was horrible to be where it is now. We are one of the Pinnacle venues in the league.”
As one of the NFL’s pinnacle locations, Buffalo gives more than lip service to its players in the locker room. The word love is often used in the player’s vocabulary. love for each other. Love for the game. And love for community.
“We love the literal core of the community,” McGovern said. “It’s all intertwined here. I don’t think there’s anything better in football than that.”
Or as Hyde puts it, “It’s an asset team. Everyone sees the organization as an organization run by good people, a very good quarterback and a small town feel. This is America in a nutshell, if you want to talk about it.”
Defensive tackle Jordan Phillips is on his third stint with the Bills. His first ones were in 2018 and 2019. He returns for two seasons in 2022. Most recently, he started this season with the Cowboys before being released in November. The bill took him. Every time I came back, coming back was not an easy task.
“It’s everything,” Phillips said. “Thank you for everything you get. I can do what I want to do. I can wear my coat. It’s just fun. People around us rally around it. Why don’t you want to come back? Why wouldn’t you want to be part of this? The destination didn’t have much of a destination, but it does now. I think that’s the best way to say it. It speaks to the team and the community around it. When you come here you’ll be like ‘s—.’ But when you’re here, you’re like, ‘Oh yeah, this is it.’”
Phillips will know about your destination city. He played in the league’s biggest markets: Arizona, Miami, New York, and Dallas. But the more he stuck out, the more Phillips realized how different the buffalo were. Weather and nightlife don’t make a destination. In such a big place, Phillips said there was too much to do and the team didn’t all live together. It’s rare if you’re far from the facility. There are things to do in Buffalo, but it’s generally something the team is doing together.
“You have a greater connection,” Phillips said. “It’s a college atmosphere. It takes special people and a special management team to build something like this. Because it wasn’t like this before Sean and they got here. It takes people, but once you get the right people and the right staff to buy into what you’re going for and get that MVP quarterback. This is what you get.”
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As Allen spoke with reporters this week, a mound of snow left by another lake-effect snowstorm was behind him on the practice field. The temperature dropped and approached zero. While that weather may keep some players from enjoying Buffalo, it has helped this group of players find their identities individually and collectively.
“It’s hard to put into words, but usually when people think of buffalo, they think of what’s going on right now with the snow and the cold,” Allen said. “It must be pretty tough to be in a place like this. We feel like there are people in this locker room who haven’t gotten all the recognition they deserve. You come to the last leg of your career and try to prove something to yourself as well as the world.”
That’s reason to believe that two-thirds of the country could pull the bill the rest of the way. But even though many people are behind them, that doesn’t change the feeling the bill seeks to capitalize on. Phillips was quick to point out the lack of All-Pro and Pro Bowl team billing. In his eyes, Buffalo will never get the recognition it deserves.
“This is not what is here,” he said. “People are annoyed because they don’t get the attention of the state that they deserve. But the community has much more to offer you. You love it here, you know what I’m saying? It’s almost like you’re a legend. At the end of the day, that’s all you really need.”
Many players in the bill mentioned that they have deleted their social media. So they don’t necessarily know how full the bandwagon is. They also know it has to do with the simple fact that the Chiefs won. repeatedly. Some fans may complain about the perception that the Chiefs are receiving favorable calls or that Taylor Swift appears on air too often. But the root of it all is that the Chiefs are holding the league back as a whole.
Bills tight end Dawson Knox is a Star Wars fan, so he smiled at the comparison between the boss and the evil empire.
“We’ll be bringing in extra fans,” Knox said. But our fan base doesn’t need us to add anyone else to make us feel good. “I always think of them as the good guys and them as the bad guys, the ones we play with.”
Coaches showed a video of a talking head criticizing the Bills for one reason or another during the Bills’ pregame meeting against the Ravens. They relied heavily on the underdog role. You shouldn’t need any external motivation this time. Despite a 4-1 record in the regular season since Allen and Patrick Mahomes took over, Buffalo is 0-3 in the playoffs against Kansas City. And a potential trip to the Super Bowl is motivation enough.
“When I was little, I was tired of my oldest brother always spanking me,” Phillips said. “If you want to be king, you have to bring out the king.”
Regardless of how it ends, it’s clear that this Bills team is not the same Connors used to jokingly call America’s team on SportsCenter. This version is the real deal.
“It’s hard to get around,” Phillips said. “For the next few years, especially when the new stadium is built, it’s going to be like, ‘We’re here to stay.’
(Top photo: Kathryn Riley, Steven King, Timothy T. Ludwig/Getty Photo)
