PHOENIX — Buffalo Bills head coach Rex Ryan sat in a meeting earlier this month with his coaching staff, front office and management when a phone rang.
General manager Doug Whaley answered. The Eagles were on the other line.
“You guys want LeSean McCoy?”
“We were just kind of like stunned there for a little bit,” Ryan said Tuesday morning during the AFC coaches breakfast roundtable media session at the Arizona Biltmore resort. “We’re like, ‘Really? Wow.’ So let’s just take it from there.”
Within 30 minutes, Ryan estimated, the deal was done.
“Obviously we were interested,” he added. “We knew it wasn’t going to be cheap by any stretch, and losing a player like Kiko Alonso is obviously a steep price, but we felt really good about it.”
The Bills sent Alonso, a former Oregon linebacker who nearly won the NFL’s top defensive rookie award in 2013, to the Eagles straight up for McCoy, the Eagles’ all-time leading rusher who isn’t yet 27.
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Alonso missed last season with an ACL injury but, if healthy and near his 2013 form, he gives the Eagles a dynamic, young presence at inside linebacker.
McCoy, who led the NFL in rushing in 2013 and finished third last year, gives the Bills a new ground weapon for Ryan’s ground-and-pound offense.
Ryan made it clear that McCoy, who signed a five-year extension after the trade, would be Buffalo’s main man. Even with Fred Jackson and Bryce Brown on his roster, Ryan pledged that McCoy would be “basically our bell cow.”
“Yep, pretty much,” Ryan said. “He’ll be able to do everything. He’s a terrific receiver out of the backfield. He can run inside, can run outside, whether it’s a zone scheme or gap scheme. He can play with a fullback. In college he had a fullback in front of him all that time.”
Ryan called the swap a win for both sides and spoke highly about Alonso, who tore his ACL last year in training camp and missed the entire season.
A report had emerged shortly after the trade that Ryan had prioritized dealing away the third-year linebacker, but Ryan gave no impression that he believed Alonso wouldn’t have fit his scheme.
The Bills drafted Alonso in the second round in 2013 when their defensive coordinator was Mike Pettine, who had worked as an assistant under Ryan for 11 seasons. In Pettine’s defense, Alonso finished as runner-up to Sheldon Richardson as the NFL’s Defensive Rookie of the Year but Alonso won the PFWA’s version of the award.
“Kiko Alonso is a great football player,” Ryan said. “I’ve recognized that this guy was a heck of a football player, there’s no question about it, and a young, talented guy. But obviously what LeSean would bring to us we felt really good about.
“We never wanted to lose Kiko, there’s no question about it, but at the end of the day we’re going to do what’s best for our football team. We think trading for LeSean was that.”