The Bills aren't where they want to be seven weeks into the 2025 NFL season.
After starting the year an impressive 4-0, Buffalo has lost its last two games to the Patriots and Falcons, respectively, and currently trails New England in the AFC East standings for the first time since 2021.
So what's the deal? Is Josh Allen's lowest QBR since 2019 pulling down the rest of his offense, which scored less than 20 points in Week 6 for the first time since September of 2024? Could it be the mounting list of injuries they're dealing with—including those to Matt Milano, Terrell Bernard, and promising rookie Maxwell Hairston—catching up to them?
Or is it simply a case of the Hard Knocks curse keeping them down?
What is the 'Hard Knocks' curse?
For those unaware, the Bills were featured on HBO's annual hit docuseries Hard Knocks: Training Camp this past summer, which gave a behind-the-scenes look at Buffalo's process ahead of the 2025 campaign.
On the surface, Hard Knocks is a generally harmless, five-week puff piece about the ins and outs of a team's NFL training camp. Dig a little deeper though, and being the featured team on the program can bring an unwanted cloud of added pressure, heightened scrutiny, and—if you ask certain people—a curse that follows into the regular season.
In the end, whether this is what Buffalo is truly dealing with is impossible to say. But for the sake of discussion, here's a closer look at the history of those who have been featured on Hard Knocks, and what they've had to deal with that season:
Final Record of Every 'Hard Knocks' Team Since 2001
Since the inception of Hard Knocks in 2001, 20 teams have been featured on the program, with just seven advancing to the NFL postseason that year.
To be fair, prior to this season, it was inherently difficult for a team to appear on Hard Knocks and find success that same year due to eligibility restrictions. Only teams that hadn’t made the playoffs in either of the previous two years, didn’t have a first-year head coach, and hadn’t been featured in the past 10 seasons could be selected.
Given that, there we've seen some bad teams take the big screen.
Here's a complete look at every team that's been featured on Hard Knocks, what their record was that season, and if they qualified for the playoffs.
Not great, Bob.
Notable Teams That Dealt with 'Hard Knocks' Curse
Here's a run down of some notable teams that have endured hardship after being featured on Hard Knocks.
2024 Chicago Bears
The Bears entered last season with some hope after selecting star USC quarterback Caleb Williams with the No. 1 overall pick. Unfortunately, after starting the season 4-2, chaos ensued. Chicago lost 10 consecutive games after its bye week and coach Matt Eberflus was fired at the end of November.
2023 New York Jets
The hype surrounding the 2023 Jets was very real. After finishing the prior year 7-10 with a mix of Joe Flacco and Zach Wilson, and Mike White at quarterback, the team traded for Aaron Rodgers from the Packers with hopes of making New York football great again.
All ambition was lost, however, once Rodgers tore his Achilles on the Jets' opening drive of the season.
2019 Oakland Raiders
The 2019 Raiders' training camp was the Antonio Brown show. After the team traded for him that offseason, Brown proceeded to make a mockery of the franchise by missing practice time due to both frostbitten feet and complaints about his non-approved helmet, having a verbal altercation with general manager Mike Mayock, and leaking audio of a conversation he had had with coach Jon Gruden.
Brown was released by the Raiders before ever playing a regular-season game, and the team went on to go 7-9 and miss the playoffs for a third consecutive year.
2016 Los Angeles Rams
The Rams were featured on 2014's Hard Knocks in large part due to drafting Jared Goff with the No. 1 pick that year—though the rookie quarterback didn't take over as the team's signal-caller until Week 11.
At that point, however, the damage had been done. Despite starting the year 3-1, Los Angeles went 1-11 down the stretch—as well as 0-7 with Goff as the starter—and fired coach Jeff Fisher in mid-December.
2014 Atlanta Falcons
After missing the postseason for just the second time in quarterback Matt Ryan's career, the Falcons were chosen for Hard Knocks in 2014—likely as an opportunity for the league to feature a franchise not in disarray, but rather one that simply suffered from a bad prior year.
Instead? Atlanta missed the playoffs for a second year in a row. Two years later, however, Ryan would go on to win the NFL's MVP award and take the Falcons to just their second Super Bowl in franchise history.
2007 Kansas City Chiefs
The 2007 Chiefs took center stage on Hard Knocks after trading quarterback Trent Green in the previous offseason and also having contract squabbles with running back Larry Johnson, tight end Tony Gonzalez, and wide receiver Dwayne Bowe.
Needless to say, their regular season didn't go too great. After a 4-3 start, Kansas City lost their final nine games and marked their penultimate season with Herm Edwards as their coach.
2002 Dallas Cowboys
The Cowboys' 2002 season is one that the franchise would like to forget.
Not only was it legendary running back Emmitt Smith's final season with the squad he had won three Super Bowl's with, but it marked Dallas's third consecutive 5-11 record and ended with coach Dave Campo being fired.
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This article was originally published on www.si.com as Are the Bills the Latest Team Dealing with the 'Hard Knocks' Curse?.