It’s hard to get away from Josh Allen.
His face, name or number are plastered everywhere from gas stations to grocery stores. More than one street with the name Allen in it around Western New York has been re-dubbed with his name on it by a fan.
Allen’s even gone national, whether it’s being on the cover of the Madden video game series or commercials for NFL Sunday Ticket, Gatorade and Gillette. I even recently flipped on an episode of Sesame Street for my 2-year-old and Allen’s fiancée, Hailee Steinfeld, was the guest star.
The finale to his NFL MVP acceptance speech, “Be good, do good, God bless and Go Bills,” is likely to be on the sign outside multiple Western New York churches by Saturday.
Still only 28, Allen is Western New York’s biggest sports star. Bigger locally than O.J. Simpson in his prime, far bigger than Gilbert Perreault or Jim Kelly and even more famous than Dominik Hasek, perhaps hockey’s greatest goaltender, who similarly put a Buffalo franchise on his back.
As if his yearly feat of hurdling over a large human being wasn’t enough, Allen took it to another level this year by throwing and catching a touchdown pass on the same play. It’s easy to believe he will someday be Buffalo’s version of Paul Bunyan.
He reached that level before becoming the first Buffalo Bills player to win MVP, and the third ever, since Thurman Thomas in 1991. Imagine what mythical status Allen would attain in Western New York if he were able to win a Super Bowl.
Just seven years into his career, a Super Bowl is the last item to check off his list, and throughout the season, Allen’s obsession was obvious. After wins, losses and everything in between, all that seemed to matter to Allen was being the last man standing at the end of the season.
“You’re not promised to get into the playoffs each and every year,” Allen said. “… You can’t just knock on the door, you got to kick it down. And that’s something that I feel like all off season is what we’re going to try to do.”
Western New York was starved for Allen. Not just because the Bills toiled 17 years with a playoff berth and tacked on another five in search of Kelly’s replacement. The area desired a star.
Doug Flutie was a viral sensation during his NFL resurgence at 36 after nearly a decade in the CFL. He became a popular underdog that fit the mold of the city, landed his own cereal, but never won a playoff game in three strange seasons.
Only two seasons into the drought, there was a rally when Drew Bledsoe was acquired from the New England Patriots. He never played in a playoff game with the Bills over three seasons.
Seven years later, future Hall of Fame receiver Terrell Owens was awarded a key to the city after signing a one-year contract. Fitzmagic came petered out when the Bills went 2-8 to finish 2011 after Ryan Fitzpatrick was awarded a six-year, $59 million extension.
Flutie was exiled from the NFL after being deemed too small early in his career, while Bledsoe’s golden boy status was revoked during the emergence of Tom Brady and Fitzpatrick was an undrafted vagabond who found a home.
So of course Allen would be the perfect fit in Buffalo. A quarterback who didn’t receive a Division I scholarship offer, still only landed two after a year of junior college and landed at Wyoming.
Are you kidding me?
He had all the tools, but he was considered by many to be too wild, too inaccurate to ever be a franchise quarterback in the NFL. And two seasons of sometimes erratic play to start his career made Allen a lightning rod for praise and criticism.
Allen figured out how to say all the right things and his win-it-all-costs, sometimes superhuman playing style endeared him to Bills fans. Make no mistake, though. Allen knows exactly who he is.
A former Bills receiver was lamenting that he couldn’t get reservations at a restaurant during the time and day he needed. Allen overheard the conversation and said he should have said something.
The receiver said the restaurant was all booked. Allen gave him a smile, shrugged and said, “Come on.” It drew a big laugh.
Someone in Allen’s position must have confidence. Like most gunslingers, Allen spent much of his early career thinking he could hit any target, no matter how many interceptions he threw.
And despite his rising stardom, Allen was content deferring to established veterans in the locker room. He enjoys being one of the guys.
But another disappointing postseason finish and subsequent roster overhaul forced Allen to change a bit. He dialed his turnover tendencies to the point the Bills had the fewest giveaways in the NFL since 1993 and he became the unquestioned team leader.
Players want to come to Buffalo for Allen. And not just offensive players, but defensive linemen like Von Miller, Leonard Floyd and Dawuane Smoot all said Allen was a big reason they decided to sign with Buffalo.
“Josh Allen’s leadership, his consistent leadership, was the biggest reason why we did what we did this season,” Bills coach Sean McDermott said. “So, anybody that tries to say otherwise, I know better. I’ve seen it, and him now doing that every season for us, not an easy undertaking, but he is and was the reason, his leadership, his play was, his play in that regard, at least, went along with, was connected, to his level of leadership on our football team.”
The last piece of the puzzle is the Super Bowl and with every crushing postseason loss, questions about whether he’s ever going to get it done are asked by someone. Dating back to his first playoff game against the Houston Texans in 2019, Allen bores scars of heartbreak.
In some ways those scars are self-inflicted. Two years in a row, Allen had the ball in his hands with a chance to slay the Kansas City Chiefs and the Bills came away without a point. But he was also the main reason they were in a position to win.
History says that Allen will eventually get his ring, because the guys tagged with a label of not being able to win the big one almost always win it. And odds grew with his improbable MVP win.
It was the fourth time in five seasons Allen finished in the top-five of voting for the award and his yards and touchdown totals were the lowest this season the the other three. And an MVP hasn’t been voted first-team All-Pro only twice previously (John Elway in 1987 and Steve McNair in 2003).
Only nine players since the AFL-NFL merger in 1970 won the MVP and never played in a Super Bowl at any point in their careers. Only four MVP quarterbacks in the Super Bowl era never played in a Super Bowl — Lamar Jackson, Brian Sipe, Bert Jones and Roman Gabriel.
“I know Josh off the field, on the field, if it’s meant for somebody to have success, or if karma is real, good karma that you put out comes back to you, that’s Josh,” Miller said. “He’s a great dude and it’s going to happen for him. It just didn’t happen for us right now.”