It has been seven months since Buffalo Bills quarterback Josh Allen stood in front of reporters trying to hold back tears and told them he’d failed his team. Four out of the five turnovers in that divisional round loss to the Denver Broncos came from Allen alone, and yet, because of that remorseful admission and a sobbing Allen in the locker room who wouldn’t even talk to the owner, two days later, former head coach Sean McDermott got axed. That’s a weight Allen has been carrying all this time.

“I think about that all the time,” Allen told The Athletic’s Mike Silver recently. “There are certain plays throughout the game – and that’s going to be for every game – where you’re like, ‘I could have done more.’ And I always feel like I can do more.”

That admission from Allen landed on Fox Sports’ First Things First, and former NFL head coach Eric Mangini had no sympathy for the 30-year-old quarterback.

“Yeah, he should feel guilty. Absolutely,” Mangini said. “Wasn’t he the one that was crying in the locker room and the owner came in, said, ‘Oh my God, the quarterback’s crying. We better fire the head coach.’ Wasn’t that the thought process? Dramatically changing the organization because there were tears after a disappointing loss that he had as much to do with as anybody else did.

“And now, he’s part of the hiring process. So I would imagine before the head coach got fired it was probably run by him and maybe he could have not signed off on it. I mean, I wasn’t there, but just judging by how involved he was in the hiring process, you think he has some juice in that organization? … So to feel guilty about the guy getting fired, yeah, it’s probably right. That’s probably about what it should be.”

Now, Sean McDermott took the Bills to the playoffs in his very first year with the team (2017). Josh Allen came a year later, and they made seven playoff trips together, all without ever appearing in the Super Bowl. The case against McDermott was already building, but for owner Terry Pegula, the last game against Mile High became the final nail in the coffin. It wasn’t all because of Allen’s turnovers, though.

McDermott was the defensive mind that was supposed to reshape Buffalo football. While that served the team well in the regular season, eight long years of playoff losses stacked against the coach. But Eric Mangini’s criticism also stems from the fact that after McDermott was let go, Allen was a part of the hiring process for the next man up. With Joe Brady getting promoted from offensive coordinator to the top job, Allen’s also shared a big vote of confidence in his new head coach.

“I can honestly say, Joe went out there, and he earned it,” Allen told Mike Silver. “The way that he interviewed, how hard he works as a coach, and the success that we’ve had as an offense over the last few years – he earned it.”

While Allen wasn’t the one who finalized the promotion of Brady, he sat in on all the interviews. That, combined with his confidence in Brady, makes both of them face tremendous pressure this season to achieve what McDermott couldn’t do. Allen himself had said that winning a Super Bowl is “the last greatest sports story in all of the world,” and he’ll be the one to make it happen. When he’d made that claim, Eric Mangini had called it “self-aggrandizing,” listing out the droughts other teams are also trying to end.

Sean McDermott is a part of Bills history now. Josh Allen still regrets his mistakes that ultimately cost them the playoffs, and by extension, McDermott’s job. If Brady and Allen can’t deliver this year, those stakes and those regrets might only get deeper. There’s a lot to prove in Buffalo this year.