why did buffalo fire mcdermott

The Buffalo Bills fired Sean McDermott mainly because, after nine seasons of regular-season success, ownership no longer believed he could get the team over the hump in the playoffs and to a Super Bowl, especially after a golden opportunity slipped away in this year’s postseason.

What the owner actually said

• Team owner Terry Pegula said the Bills “need a new structure within our leadership” to give the organization the best chance to “take our team to the next level,” even while praising McDermott’s past work.

• In plain terms, that means they felt a coaching change was necessary to maximize the current roster’s Super Bowl window, not that McDermott was a bad coach overall.

Playoff failures and missed window

• McDermott turned Buffalo into a perennial playoff team, with eight postseason appearances in nine years, but the Bills went just 8–8 in the playoffs and never reached a Super Bowl, topping out at the AFC Championship Game.

• This season especially stung: key AFC powers like the Ravens, Bengals, and Chiefs all missed the playoffs, creating a wide-open path that Buffalo still could not capitalize on, exiting after a divisional-round loss in Denver.

The Denver loss as final straw

• League insiders reported that Bills leadership felt there were multiple opportunities to beat the Broncos that were not taken advantage of, including coaching decisions late in the game.

• Even though officiating was controversial in the overtime loss, people inside the organization felt the game was still winnable with better game management, and coming up short again pushed them toward a change.

Bigger picture: why now?

• Reports describe the move as less about one bad season and more about a belief that the McDermott era had plateaued: consistent winning, but no Super Bowl appearances despite an elite quarterback in Josh Allen.

• Pegula’s decision also reflects a desire to reset the leadership structure and align fully with a new vision going forward, after years of trying and failing to break through against the NFL’s top contenders.

TL;DR: The Bills fired Sean McDermott because ownership felt that, despite regular-season success, repeated playoff disappointments—especially this year’s missed Super Bowl opportunity and the way the Denver loss unfolded—proved he was not the coach to finally deliver a Lombardi Trophy in Buffalo.

Information gathered from public forums or data available on the internet and portrayed here.