Former Bills general manager Doug Whaley, whether folks like it or not, does have his fingerprints in this current Buffalo team.
Whaley was a member of that search party which landed on Sean McDermott. Of course, how things eventually went, the two were never part of the same front office on a game day.
Because of that, in most cases and in the logical sense, Whaley is a predecessor to the current Bills regime and the proof is very much in the pudding in regard to that. The Bills right now are doing a much better job than Whaley’s ever did.
The ex-GM himself can even see that and recently compared the two. Appearing on the Go Long Podcast with Dunne & Monos, Whaley broke down what he sees in Orchard Park now compared to what was there before.
Whaley still thinks the rosters he assembled were good enough, but explained the distinct reason why he believes it didn’t come together.
“There’s a difference between having talent and having a talented team… We had a collection of really talented players, but they weren’t a talented team. You can have a guy that may be less talented, but fits in that team structure better than a guy that’s more talented,” Whaley said. “That’s exactly what the Bills have right now.”
Whaley went onto explain that the constant changes in coaching staffs and front offices, such as the type of one he worked in prior to McDermott’s arrival, makes finding such a work environment difficult.
“That’s the issue you have when you’re always changing coaches,” Whaley said, who played a part in the hiring of Doug Marrone and Rex Ryan as well.
Hindsight is 20/20, but the Bills did finally land on the right mix in their front office and coaching staff which has allowed them to build an all-encompassing product which works together like Whaley is describing. Whaley added that the current Bills have the type of team where you can find players that fit for specific jobs. His teams didn’t have that luxury and he would add players that perhaps would work in multiple systems in the future.
This naturally makes building a roster or really even committing to one coach for the long-haul pretty tough.
But through those tough times, Whaley mentioned that he thinks the Bills learned from it. During their first search for a coach which landed on Ryan in the end, Whaley said he and the Pegulas talked to many different types of coaches, from new names at the time like Adam Gase and Frank Reich, to a Super Bowl winner like Mike Shanahan.
Having seen so many different types of football guys appeared to help the Bills land on McDermott… or so Whaley at least believes helped a bit.
“We really wanted to give them the total spectrum about the type of coaches that were out there,” Whaley said.
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