Doug Whaley was formally introduced as the Bills’ new General Manager on Thursday morning, and he said something he learned during his 11 years working for the Steelers will be his guiding principle.
“They don’t accept losing,” Whaley said of the Steelers. “They set the standard of winning and competing for championships. I think we instill that here, we’ll be in the right direction.”
Whaley becomes the first minority to be hired as a coach or G.M. this year: At the start of this offseason, eight NFL teams hired new head coaches and seven hired new General Managers, and all 15 people hired for those positions were white. John Wooten, executive director of the Fritz Pollard Alliance, which promotes diversity in hiring in the NFL, sees Whaley’s hiring as a positive step.
“It’s meaningful,” Wooten told Tim Graham of the Buffalo News. “It gives us a good lift.”
If Whaley can turn “don’t accept losing” into more than just a slogan, he’ll give the Bills a good lift.