ORCHARD PARK - From the moment Buffalo Bills coach Sean McDermott and general manager Brandon Beane arrived a few months apart in 2017, so began a painstaking process of essentially tearing down a wayward organization and rebuilding it from scratch.

Seven years later, both men indicated Tuesday during separate season-ending press conferences that they believe what they have built along One Bills Drive has aged well, but with three straight exits in the divisional round of the postseason, it has reached the point where the time has come to start fixing a few of those loose floor boards or leaky pipes, so to speak.

“This is not a situation where you strip it down to the studs and start all over,” McDermott said. “Every year is a challenge to figure out how to put it back together again to put yourself in position to win. When you’ve had the success we’ve had - six out of seven years in the playoffs is significant and hard to do as well as four AFC East titles and now five years of 10-plus wins is impressive and did not come easy. We look forward to continuing to reach for and strive for that ultimate goal of winning a world championship.”

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Added Beane, “While we’re extremely disappointed, nobody’s more disappointed than me. I’m also not gonna just throw the whole season out and say, ‘Let’s tear this thing up and start over.’”

Here are some of the key topics that McDermott addressed during his session:

Buffalo Bills had issues before the six-game win streak

McDermott acknowledged his pleasure over how the Bills rallied from 6-6 at their bye week to win five straight games which enabled them to steal the AFC East from the Dolphins, and then took care of the Steelers in the wild-card game before falling to the Chiefs.

However, he was not willing to overlook the problems that led to the Bills being 6-6 and in 11th place in the conference standings after they lost in overtime to Philadelphia on Thanksgiving weekend.

“That’s a critical piece of the evaluation,” McDermott said. “When you go back to it, even though we did what we did, how did we get there (6-6)? In my mind as a coach, confident in our abilities and our players’ abilities, but it’s ‘we should have never gotten there to begin with.’

“It’s lessons learned from that. It’s, ‘Hey, let’s make sure we don’t get into that spot again. Overall it’s a lot of valuable lessons that as a staff we can take from that earlier part of the season, I believe some of our players can take from that earlier part of the season as well. And some of that got corrected, which was good to see during the season, where what went wrong early in the year was executed better, I’ll say, on the back half of the season.”

Did Joe Brady do enough to keep the coordinator job?

There has been no decision made regarding taking the interim tag off Brady’s role as the offensive play caller. Besides, the Bills have to go through an interviewing process that must include talking to minority candidates to satisfy the Rooney Rule; they can’t just name Brady as the OC.

However, assuming they don’t find a more suitable candidate, McDermott was pleased with how the offense functioned after he made the switch from Ken Dorsey.

“That’ll happen in due time with respect to what we do with that position,” McDermott said. “Evaluating that position as well as others, it’s natural this time of year. I thought Joe did a really nice job coming in and building great communication, collaboration, a vibe with Josh.

“I know there’s some buzz out there already on some things and it’s so early. And with the way the rules are now with the coaching and who can go and who can’t, and it’s almost like free agency, so there’s a lot of moving pieces.”

It wasn’t perfect, by any means, but Brady also had to make do with Dorsey’s offensive structure because you can’t just tear up the playbook in the middle of the season and start fresh. Brady was able to manipulate what was already in there and put his finger prints on some things and the Bills won seven of the nine games where he was in charge.

Allen, as you would have figured, gave Brady his endorsement when he spoke on Monday, saying that “I love what he brings to this team, to our offense, the juice that he has, the passion he has for football. How much preparation he’s put into a tough situation these last seven to eight weeks. Yeah, I would fully embrace that.”

McDermott said that yes, Allen’s input will obviously be considered because, “It’s big. You’ve got to have the buy-in from your franchise quarterback or any quarterback for that matter. And certainly at the end of the day, it’ll be my decision but yeah, I respect Josh’s opinion, I respect his position on it and it does factor into the overall equation.”

Stefon Diggs’ drop in production needs to be evaluated

The No. 1 receiver did not have a 100-yard game after Week 6, and there were times when his production was way below what it has been in the past, and what it needed to be.

McDermott didn’t really know why that was, but he made it known that he remained confident in Diggs moving forward.

“I can’t say in particular why specifically. If I could, we would flip it back that way, right, to the way it started earlier in the year,” he said. “Sometimes defenses evolve, sometimes there are more things on tap through the course of the season and people copy them, what’s on tape. Listen, Stef is a great player. I love Stef. He was a phenomenal teammate. I like how the offense found some rhythm, though, under Joe, and Stef got back involved at times, especially down the stretch, at least in the last two or three games, so to speak.”

Who will be the Bills defensive coordinator in 2024?

McDermott added that role to his plate in 2023 after Leslie Frazier left the team. There were certainly skeptics who wondered if McDermott was doing too much, but the reality was that he did a nice job returning to his roots as a play caller, especially when you consider the incredible amount of injuries and adversity the defense faced.

“I was able to get back into the seat a little bit,” he said before thanking his staff for the support he received as he negotiated those waters. “I felt like overall it was knocking some rust off early, maybe just getting back into the seat of doing it again, but I felt very comfortable back in that position. Certainly more work on one’s plate when you do that, when you take on a dual role like that, and that will be evaluated as I go forward here and we go forward.”

Which means, it seems like he will continue to do both jobs rather than hire a new defensive coordinator, or promote from within. If the latter were to occur, it feels like linebackers coach Bobby Babich would be his preferred candidate. However, Babich is going to be interviewing with Giants head coach Brian Daboll for their vacant coordinator position so there's a chance he could be leaving.

“Bobby and I have been together a number of years, going back to our time together in Carolina,” McDermott said. “He’s developed players, and I think when you evaluate a coach, it’s are you taking what you have and making it better? It doesn’t need to get any more complex than that and Bobby’s done that.”

Confidence remains high in Tyler Bass

It was not a great year for the fourth-year kicker, capped of course by his 44-yard wide right miss that prevented the Bills from tying the Chiefs. For the season Bass went 26 of 34 on field goals including a pretty dreadful 2 of 5 in the postseason, though he was excellent on extra points (56 of 57 which cannot be overlooked).

The 2020 sixth-round pick was given a hefty contract extension prior to 2023 and he did not live up to it, at least in this first season.

“I would just tell you that I am confident in Tyler, and I’ll start there and I’ll end there,” McDermott said. “Yes, there were some kicks we need to make, no doubt about it. He knows that, and there’s no one that works harder at it than he does and takes more pride in the work that he puts in. He’s deeply invested in his teammates and this team, and I’m very confident that he’s gonna do what’s necessary this offseason to get himself just right.”

There was nothing definitive on Tre’Davious White’s future

White holds a special place in McDermott’s heart because he was the first player he selected in the draft as a head coach in 2017. And White has more than rewarded McDermott’s faith as he became one of the premier cornerbacks in the NFL.

But his future in Buffalo is cloudy because after suffering a torn ACL in 2021, he blew out his Achilles in 2023. That’s two major leg injuries at a position where speed and agility are paramount to success. Plus, White’s contract carries a massive $16.4 million cap hit in 2024.

For a team that needs all the space it can get, it’s possible White could be released, though that decision is still far from decided.

“Tre’s done a lot of great things here. He was my first draft pick, but he’s gone through two serious injuries right now, two very similar injuries. So we just need to take it one day at a time and full confidence that he will be fine,” said McDermott, which came off as a not so encouraging sign for White. “When he gets out there we will know more as to how he’s going to look and how he’s going to feel and what level of ability to contribute to our team that he will have.”

Von Miller likely isn’t going anywhere

The former star edge rusher was an almost completely useless player in 2023 as he never found any footing coming off his torn ACL. It was stunning how little of an impact he made as he registered three tackles, no sacks, and 13 QB pressures in 257 defensive snaps.

However, he at least looked like he had a pulse in the playoffs as he had four pressures on 41 snaps against the Steelers and Chiefs. That, apparently, was enough to give McDermott hope that with another offseason of healing, Miller can return in 2024 and be closer to the player he was before the injury.

Of course, the Bills don’t have a choice because if they were to cut him, they would have to swallow a $32.1 million dead cap hit.

“His best game was the last game of the season,” McDermott said. “And my hope is that that is a good direction for where we pick up at the beginning of next season. What he came back from and the way he worked, certainly was impressive.”

Sal Maiorana can be reached at maiorana@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter @salmaiorana. To subscribe to Sal's newsletter, Bills Blast, which comes out twice a week during the season, please follow this link: https://profile.democratandchronicle.com/newsletters/bills-blast

This article originally appeared on Rochester Democrat and Chronicle: Buffalo Bills news and updates: Confidence in Tyler Bass among topics