ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. -- Rex Ryan had already acknowledged defeat last Sunday as the final minute ticked off the New Era Field clock with the New England Patriots holding a lopsided 41-17 lead over Ryan's once-promising Buffalo Bills.
Yet, for a moment, Ryan had something else on his mind: He wanted seldom-used rookie running back Jonathan Williams to score a touchdown as the Bills approached the end zone. Williams had been stopped short of the goal line on a run from the 1-yard line, but replays showed the fifth-round pick might have scored as he fell forward and stretched out his arm.
Because there were less than two minutes remaining in the second half, Ryan couldn't use a challenge, and the play wasn't automatically reviewable because it wasn't deemed a score on the field. In protest, Ryan tossed his red challenge flag, but it wasn't noticed until the Bills snapped the ball and Williams easily scored his first NFL touchdown.
Docked a timeout because he wasn't allowed to challenge the play, Ryan gave a dismissive wave to an official and walked back, headset off, down the sideline. His grin told the story of a coach who had made his point -- even if Williams made it moot shortly thereafter.
"The game [was] over, I get it," Ryan explained Tuesday. "But it [would have been] nice if this kid got a touchdown. I said, 'It’s clearly a touchdown.' So they didn’t do it and I did something stupid."
The moment was a microcosm of Ryan's career in Buffalo, and perhaps, all eight of his years as an NFL head coach. He has his players' backs and his teams have sometimes carried a reputation for not being disciplined.
As Ryan begins the second half of the Bills' season Monday night against the Seattle Seahawks, little seems to have changed from the start of this season, last season or the bulk of his time as the New York Jets coach. The Bills are 4-4 this season, on pace to match their disappointing 8-8 finish in 2015. Now 12-12 as the Bills' coach and not having appeared in the postseason since 2010 with the Jets, Ryan must pick up the pace in order to avoid becoming the fourth coach since the 1970 AFL-NFL merger to miss the postseason in six consecutive seasons.
There's a reason why Ryan has made it this long without being kicked to the curb. He's known as a master motivator with unyielding loyalty to his players. Williams, who has sat at the bottom of the Bills' running-back depth chart since the beginning of the season, would be an afterthought for some coaches and might have been cast off by other teams when he was arrested for suspicion of DWI in July, before his first NFL snap.
After Ryan burned a timeout at a meaningless point in the game to protest his little-known running back not being awarded a touchdown, Williams took to Twitter to thank his coach:
This is the Rex we see everyday and why we hate to let him down https://t.co/OUblIeIESL
— Jonathan Williams (@Jwillpart2) November 2, 2016
Not surprisingly, Bills players have generally enjoyed their experience with Ryan, whose coaching style is in sharp contrast to how demanding former coach Doug Marrone attempted to run his team. It is a relaxed atmosphere where the focus seems to be more on the results than the method.
Take, for instance, Ryan's decision to rent a bus and bring about a dozen of his staffers and friends to Game 7 of the World Series in Cleveland last Wednesday night. Most coaches would balk at the idea of a 200-mile trip five days before a nationally televised game, but not Ryan. To him, the retreat won't have an impact on the outcome of Monday's game in Seattle, much as Ryan believes his other opportunities for fun -- such as jumping on reporters' conference call with Julian Edelman in Week 4 -- are harmless in the big picture.
Ryan is probably right, but should the Bills' current .500 path continue, the optics of his approach won't be in his favor. Another 8-8 season might not cost Ryan his job because he would have a slew of injuries to blame for the result, and his locker room would likely remain loyal to its affable coach, but that wouldn't tell the whole story.
As much as fans are entertained by Ryan and might be encouraged by what his players say about him, they expect more than a 12-12 record through his first 24 games and a better-than-not chance that Buffalo's playoff drought reaches 17 years by January. They expect more from a defensive-minded coach than seeing him and his players outclassed by Tom Brady on the Bills' own field, and they expect a lot more from a team that was billed as a playoff contender upon Ryan's arrival last year.
Perhaps, on a national stage Monday night at CenturyLink Field, the Ryan-led Bills will provide fans what they've been waiting for.