ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. -- When Ken Dorsey was the Buffalo Bills' quarterbacks coach, he had his responsibilities during practice down pat. After five years as a QB coach with the Carolina Panthers, followed by three years with the Bills, he had plenty of experience as a position coach.
But after being elevated to Bills offensive coordinator after Brian Daboll was hired as the New York Giants' head coach, Dorsey is learning a different practice routine as voluntary OTAs continue. Some of that is just getting through the little things.
“There’s sometimes, it’s like that 'Talladega Nights' [line] where, ‘I don’t know what to do with my hands,'" Dorsey said. “Sometimes you’re just like, ‘What am I supposed to do right now?’ ... A lot of times you end up kind of gravitating back towards the quarterbacks a little bit. But I’ve definitely tried to make a concerted effort this year to be in each room.”
Dorsey is the second offensive coordinator of quarterback Josh Allen's NFL career. Prior to receiving his promotion, Dorsey received public and private endorsements from Allen, who had a close relationship with Daboll during their four years working together. Other players have weighed in, too.
"I got 100% confidence in Dorse," wide receiver Stefon Diggs said. "When I was having conversations with him in the season, as far as like what plays and what routes that I like, and he was like, 'Well, we can do it this way, we can do it that way,' and just having that creative offensive mind, it got me excited."
While it will be Dorsey’s first time as a coordinator, he has two former Panthers offensive coordinators on his staff -- Joe Brady and Mike Shula -- to help lead an offense and a team that's coming into the year with high expectations (+650 favorites to win the Super Bowl per Caesars Sportsbook).
Many of those expectations revolve around what Allen can do after he put up gaudy postseason numbers in two games (48-of-63 for 637 yards with 9 TDs and no INTs).
Allen and Dorsey believe the relationship they established over the past three years will help them work together in Dorsey's new role.
“I feel like having a good feel for him on kind of how he reacts to things, the things he likes, the things he doesn’t like, and I think all that’s really important,” Dorsey said of Allen. “... I think you'd be crazy as a coordinator not to have the input of your quarterback or the guys on the offense.
"Now, is there going to be times where, it's like, 'Well, no, Josh, we're going to do it this way. But here's why.' ... So, I think there's going to be a lot of that input back and forth with me and him because he's got a great feel for the game and a great mind for the game.”
There are similarities from Daboll’s tenure as offensive coordinator that will carry over. The terminology for the playbook isn’t changing, which makes life easier for Allen.
Bills quarterback Matt Barkley, who re-joined the team this offseason, told ESPN there isn’t anything drastically different between the two coordinators, but that Dorsey has “added his own twist in [a] few different ways” when it comes to playcalls. Dorsey prioritizes discussing the intention of a play, having the players ask questions to understand why a play is being called. Barkley expects the offense to do a better job meshing the run game with play-action this season.
“Everybody's got their own style, their own flair, in terms of what they want to show, what they want the defense to think they're trying to call,” Allen said. “The one thing that [Daboll and Dorsey] do share is an extremely competitive nature. They get fired up in practice and they start yapping a little bit to the defensive guys, and they want to call their best stuff. So, I'm excited for that.”
Dorsey’s experience as a quarterback -- he went 38-2 and won a national championship while at Miami -- plays into his competitiveness. In addition to his time with the Hurricanes, he spent five seasons in the NFL as a backup before joining the Panthers as a pro scout in 2011.
That competitive nature has come out in a variety of ways already. During a team dodgeball game, Dorsey cussed out one of the referees and did everything he could to find an edge.
“You could see his competitive juices coming up,” Barkley said.
Receiver Gabriel Davis joked that Dorsey should call plays from the coaching booth during games because of how quickly he gets fired up.
“You don't know when it’s gonna come out," center Mitch Morse said jokingly. "And it's funny at times, but at the same time you don’t want to be on the other end of that because it can be ruthless.”