Bills Mafia is being accused of losing faith in the team ahead of 2024 season

The Buffalo Bills have been one of the more successful franchises in the NFL over the last five years. The team has made it to the playoffs in each of the last five seasons and have won the division four years in a row.

Why then, are Bills fans ranked 23rd on The Athletic's Hope-O-Meter for the 2024 season? Even teams not expected to do much like the Broncos, Commanders, Cardinals, and Titans have fans more optimistic than Buffalo's. So what gives Bills Mafia?

Why are Bills fans so pessimistic about the 2024 season?

The article provides insight from positive and negative fans and the Bills had three optimistic fans' comments included compared to just one pessismistic comment, making it even stranger that they're ranked as low as they are.

The pessimist's comment was from someone named Peter who said that he thinks injuries and new players are going to disrupt the flow. He also said that all of the great quarterbacks are in the AFC and that is true with Patrick Mahomes, Joe Burrow, Lamar Jackson, and of course, Josh Allen all residing in the AFC.

Peter certainly has a solid point with his pessimistic takes. The Bills have suffered injuries this offseason, most notably to Matt Milano and the team lost a lot of key contributors over the offseason. He's also right that the Bills are in the more difficult conference and the AFC East has three very talented quarterbacks in Allen, Aaron Rodgers, and Tua Tagovailoa. Heck, the Bills aren't even favored to win the division this year. Of course, these odds can change on a whim, but as of this writing, the Jets are favored to take the AFC East.

It's not all doom and gloom though. For the optimists, George noted that the media has shied away from picking the Bills this year, which works in Buffalo's favor. Roy said that the Bills have now exited Allen Era 1.0 and will be entering Allen Era 2.0 and that this could be an outlier year but if the team makes the playoffs, anything can happen. Finally, John points out that while he's not as confident as before some of the preseason injuries, the Bills are a playoff team.

Truthfully, the Bills are probably lower on the Hope-O-Meter because while they've been a good team, at the end of the day, they don't have anything to show for it. They've yet to reach the Super Bowl and haven't been to the AFC Championship Game since the 2020 season when they got blown out by Kansas City.

Until the Bills show they can make a deeper run in the playoffs, fans are going to continue to lean more toward the pessimistic scale. The good news is that as long as Josh Allen is their quarterback, they'll always be in the running to win a Super Bowl.