Bills season crushed by endless injuries from camp to finale

DENVER - Almost from the moment the Buffalo Bills stepped foot on the grass fields at St. John Fisher University, injuries became one of the biggest storylines of their flawed and doomed 2025 season.

The parade of players going down was something unlike we’ve ever seen, at least that I can recall in my four decades plus covering this team.

Sure, maybe there were worse seasons, I can’t remember them all at the top of my head, but 2025 is fresh in my mind, and I don’t think it’s even up for debate that the amount of man-games the Bills lost due to injury is as big a reason why their season came to a catastrophic finish Saturday night with a 33-30 overtime loss to the Denver Broncos.

How injuries defined the Bills 2025 season

It began with Tyler Bass being unable to kick in training camp, ultimately resulting in him missing the entire season, and it ended late in the fourth quarter against the Broncos, with the Bills trying to hold on to a 27-23 lead. Tre’Davious White suffered a stinger and left the field for just one play, but what a fateful play it was as Denver coach Sean Payton attacked his replacement, Dane Jackson, and the result was a go-ahead Bo Nix to Marvin Mims touchdown with 55 seconds left in regulation.

Injuries. They crushed the Bills all year, right down to the bitter end.

According to Rotowire, the Bills lost 246 games to injury which was actually only the fifth-highest total behind the Cardinals (303), Lions (274), Dolphins (265), and 49ers (254). However, there were some big-time players who went down and Ed Oliver, Michael Hoecht, Dalton Kincaid, DaQuan Jones, Terrel Bernard, Shaq Thompson, Matt Milano, Max Hairston, TJ Sanders, Taylor Rapp, and Taron Johnson all missed multiple games.

Buffalo Bills depth stretched thin in the moments it mattered most

Look at what happened in this game alone. It’s almost incomprehensible how bad Buffalo’s injury misfortune was.

“We’ve been rolling dice in the lineups all season long and nobody shied away from going out there,” coach Sean McDermott said after the game, trying not to use injuries as an excuse because he wouldn’t do that. “Nobody shied away from doing their job, trying to do their job to the best of their ability.”

But that’s the thing. Because of all the injuries, the Bills had to use players in too many situations all year, and specifically in this loss, who had no business being on the field. Here are three clear examples, all of which played a huge role in the defeat.

▶ In the second quarter, on the play where James Cook fumbled, center Connor McGovern suffered a head injury and had to be evaluated for a concussion. While he was in the locker room, Alec Anderson took over at center on the next Bills’ possession.

They drove to the Denver 14 and had a second-and-9, and Anderson one-hopped a shotgun snap to Josh Allen who corralled the ball but ultimately could not escape being sacked for a four-yard loss by Malcolm Roach. That killed the chance for a possible touchdown, and the Bills wound up settling for a Matt Prater field goal that tied the game at 10-10.

▶ On Denver’s ensuing possession, safety Cam Lewis - who started the game in place of Jordan Poyer, who became the starter after Damar Hamlin took over for the original starter Taylor Rapp who had been lost for the season months ago - suffered a leg cramp and had to leave the field. His replacement was Darnell Savage, who wasn’t even on the team until early December.

Knowing Savage was out there, Payton was licking his chops and he called a deep shot over the middle with wide receiver Lil’Jordan Humphrey running a post into Savage’s coverage area. Nix went right there, Humphrey beat Savage and reeled in a 29-yard TD for a 17-10 lead.

“It’s partly on them,” McDermott said of his players, “but give (the Broncos) credit for attacking where there was somebody who wasn’t the player who’s normally there.”

▶ And then came the Jackson play. White was hurt when Nix ran to convert a third-and-4 and went to the sideline, even though he felt he could have kept playing.

“I caught a stinger,” White said. “You’ve got to get checked for a concussion once you get one of those. Kind of just wasting my time.”

With Maxwell Hairston injured and not available, the Bills turned to Jackson who had been elevated from the practice squad, a player who played only six snaps of defense all season, all on days when he was called up from the practice squad due to injuries.

Even though scoring quickly left Allen nearly a minute to produce a possible tying or winning drive, Payton saw blood in the water and had Nix go right at Jackson. It was like stealing candy from a baby as Mims ran right past Jackson and Nix delivered a dime.

“It’s man-to-man coverage. I’ve got to win,” Jackson said. “(Mims) pretty much ran a double move, I’ve just got to win. I’ve got to make a play. I mean, pretty much that simple from my standpoint.”

What Sean McDermott and Josh Allen said about the injury toll

Days before the game, I asked McDermott if he could recall a season where one of his teams has dealt with the amount of injuries this one had.

“Every year there’s injuries, you expect the injuries, it is a part of the game, but the amount we’ve had this year is significant,” he admitted.

As a teary-eyed Allen said after regarding what the Bills endured across 19 games, during which they never once had their full complement of starters on the field together, he said, “It’s been a long season.”

Sal Maiorana has covered the Buffalo Bills for more than four decades including 36 years as the full-time beat writer/columnist for the D&C. He has written numerous books about the history of the team, and he is also co-host of the BLEAV in Bills podcast/YouTube show. He can be reached at [email protected], and you can follow him on X @salmaiorana and on Bluesky @salmaiorana.bsky.social.

This article originally appeared on Rochester Democrat and Chronicle: Buffalo Bills injury crisis leads to heartbreaking OT loss