The Bills are shaking things up after their latest crushing loss.
Ken Dorsey was fired as the Bills’ offensive coordinator Tuesday morning, the team announced, following Buffalo’s 24-22 loss to the Denver Broncos on “Monday Night Football” and ahead of playing host to the Jets on Sunday.
“Just felt like it was time for a change,” Bills coach Sean McDermott told reporters. “You know, we need to be a confident offensive football team and find consistent production, and that’s really what it came down to.”
Quarterbacks coach Joe Brady is taking over as the interim offensive coordinator.
Amid a season of Super Bowl aspirations, the Bills are 5-5 and sit a half-game behind the Houston Texans for the No. 7 spot in the AFC.
McDermott kept it pretty simple when asked what he wanted to see from the offense under Brady.
“Just more than anything, like I just said, is come out with an energy about our offense and what we’re doing and move the football and score points,” McDermott said. “That’s really the offense’s job at the end of the day.”
Dorsey, 42, was promoted from quarterbacks coach to offensive coordinator in 2022 when Brian Daboll left to become the Giants head coach.
Josh Allen went 15-for-26 with 177 yards, one touchdown and two interceptions in Monday’s loss and leads the NFL with 11 interceptions this season.
“I’m confident that he’ll find it,” McDermott said of Allen. “And I think, again, just some of the new energy around our offense, my hope is and my aim is that it will create a little bit of confidence, clarity and ability to anticipate as opposed to in some cases react.”
The Bills blew the game when they were penalized for having 12 men on the field for Broncos kicker Wil Lutz’s failed 41-yard field-goal attempt with four seconds left, giving Lutz a second chance from 36 yards, which he converted as time expired.
The Bills are averaging 370.1 yards of offense per game this season, seventh-most in the NFL, and their 26.2 points per game is the eighth-most in the league.
But things have been rocky for the Bills since their three-game winning streak from Weeks 2-4, when they scored 38, 37 and 48 points, respectively.
The Bills have lost four of their last six games, during which they’ve averaged 20.5 points per game.
“I think it’s important that those guys feel, hey, something’s changed, right? And there’s something new that we can be excited about in terms of an opportunity to improve, really,” McDermott said. “I think that’s a piece of it, but also, like I said, it just got to be the right time right now to make the move and see if we can get some energy about our offense right now.”
Dorsey, who won a college national championship as the quarterback for Miami (Fla.), played for the 49ers and Browns before transitioning into coaching.
After scouting for the Panthers, Carolina made Dorsey its quarterbacks coach in 2013 and he was fired after the 2017 season.
Dorsey was hired by the Bills for the same position in 2019.
He went viral on Sept. 25, 2022, when video showed him going apoplectic in the coaches’ booth, slamming his headset and tablet after Bills receiver Isaiah McKenzie failed to get out of bounds, meaning Buffalo ran out of time to kick a potential game-winning field goal.