When Fox’s Colin Cowherd ranked his Top 10 NFL quarterbacks this offseason, Buffalo Bills quarterback Josh Allen received the top spot, with Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes coming in second on that list. But seven straight playoff appearances and exits have left a bitter taste in Allen’s mouth, and for Cowherd, that heartbreak starts at the very top – from the owner, through the GM, and down to the head coach. In that regard, Cowherd believes Mahomes got the better end of the bargain.

“Josh Allen and Mahomes entered the league one year apart,” Cowherd said in a recent edition of The Herd. “Mahomes got the better owner arguably, GM, coach, and weapons: Travis Kelce. In an offensive league, the weapon matters. Offensive coach, Andy Reid. So a lot of advantages just didn’t go Josh Allen’s way.”

Now, the case for the Kansas City Chiefs builds itself effortlessly. Andy Reid was already a world-class football coach when he moved from the Eagles to the Chiefs in 2013. Before the Mahomes era began in KC, Reid had already taken the Chiefs to the playoffs three times in four years, along with a divisional title in 2016. Once Mahomes took the reins of the franchise, he helped Reid get the AFC West title eight years in a row – a streak that only broke last season.

Five Super Bowl appearances and three titles later, there was no question about the Chiefs being in their dynasty years. But it wasn’t all because of coach Reid. Brett Veach came to Kansas City in 2013 as a Pro and college personnel analyst from Philadelphia, the same year Reid switched teams. By the time he became the general manager in 2017 and discovered Patrick Mahomes, he’d already established himself as a cornerstone. He has consistently found elite talent in the drafts even though the Chiefs were never high up on the draft board with their picks. Those weapons – like Tyreek Hill (2016 pick), Travis Kelce (2013), and Creed Humphrey (2021) have solidified their elite status.

The Hunt family, additionally, has always gone above and beyond to help build a championship team. Clark Hunt has been front and center in recent years when talking about team developments, and his quest to build a new stadium for the Chiefs is only going to make them a bigger franchise financially. And then there are the moves Mahomes himself made for his team.

Mahomes has been weighing in on the Chiefs’ draft picks for years, choosing the right playmakers that have kept the KC in contention year after year. What’s more, now entering Year 10, he has restructured his contract at least 6 times to free up cap space for the Chiefs. More cap space equals better weapons, and the results are hard to argue with. But what about Josh Allen?

Since Allen joined the Buffalo Bills in 2018, he has led his team to seven playoff berths, but has fallen short of reaching the Super Bowl every single time. Under former head coach Sean McDermott – who took the reins of the franchise in 2017 – Buffalo has earned 5 straight AFC East titles from 2020 through 2024. Call it fate or something else, four of the playoff defeats in that tenure came at the hands of Patrick Mahomes himself. And after last season’s divisional defeat at the hands of the Denver Broncos, the Bills decided to move on from McDermott. Offensive coordinator Joe Brady is the next man up – a change Allen is quite excited about.

“We’ve obviously got a new head coach, and so to have those memories being made in a new spot – and I think change is needed sometimes, especially when we’ve been close in the past, even going back to 20-ish, 30-ish years ago, just how close the Bills have been to winning a Super Bowl – I think this is kind of a switch and was necessary and I’m very excited,” Allen has said.

But whether it was the coaching blueprint or the draft board the Bills drew up every year, one cannot argue that it hasn’t been enough. When general manager Brandon Beane came in 2017, he took a wrecking ball to the old roster and built anew. Beyond drafting Allen, he also brought stars like Tremaine Edmunds, Ed Oliver, and a lot of other free agents. But the cap space hasn’t always been kind to him.

Like Mahomes, even Allen has restructured his contract thrice to make more room to build around him. But the space he created has been significantly lower than what Mahomes did. This year alone, Allen accounts for 14.68% of the team’s cap space owing to the $330 million extension he signed in 2025. This is something even Joe Brady had addressed this February, saying: “When your quarterback’s making as much money as he is, you’re gonna have to build through the draft.”

Going back to Colin Cowherd’s argument, he makes the case that the New England Patriots – Allen’s divisional rivals – are a young group making very little money. The Bills, meanwhile, have a lot of veterans draining the cap.

“So that’s what worries me. Not that the window’s closed, that New England now has the better coach, an elite quarterback, a great owner, lots of historic momentum and success, and a lot more good young players,” Cowherd said. “Buffalo right now is ranked 29th in terms of talent – 25 and under. You can blame the GM, but some of it becomes: you’re not paying Drake Maye and you’re paying Josh Allen a lot, and you’ve got to move off really good players.”

Now, Allen hasn’t let the adversities get the better of him. He had been fighting back tears when he spoke to reporters after their playoff exit last season, but now, he has a newer, more optimistic outlook. When he sat down with ESPN’s Kevin Clark recently, Allen made it clear that if the Bills “knock enough at the door, it’s going to open at some point.” Whether that door opens to a first Super Bowl this year or not, the new coaching blueprint of Joe Brady and Allen’s positive outlook would contribute directly to it.