ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. — The Highmark Stadium lights dimmed as the Buffalo Bills prepared to exit the tunnel. Smoke filled the field under a pink hue.
The starting defense was announced one by one before the team’s first “Monday Night Football” game of this season, Week 3 against the Jacksonville Jaguars.
As safety Taylor Rapp was called out of the pop-up wagon-tunnel, the last player was set to emerge. This moment of significance was not lost on Damar Hamlin, who made the sign of the cross before stretching out his arms, circling and then pumping his fists when his name was called, taking in the cheers that rained down.
Hamlin ran through the smoke and joined his teammates.
The Bills went on to beat the Jaguars, 47-10.
Mondays have been important within the arc of Hamlin’s NFL career. It was during a “Monday Night Football” game in Week 17 of the 2022 season when Hamlin suffered cardiac arrest against the Cincinnati Bengals, setting off an outpouring of concern and sympathy that transcended football in the following days and weeks.
It was also on “Monday Night Football” — the blowout of the Jaguars — when he recorded his first career interception. The days in between saw Hamlin progress from a backup safety with an uncertain future to a starter on the Bills’ defense.
With countless Mondays to come — starting with a MNF jaunt against the New York Jets (8:15 p.m. ET, ESPN) in which the Bills are looking to break out of a two-game slump — Hamlin is working to strengthen his role on the field while growing his impact off it.
“I won’t lie, Monday nights are a little bit more meaningful to me, but I’m so deep into my process that maybe when it’s all said and done and I’m back reflecting and I’m doing whatever I’m doing after I’m done playing, and watching ‘Monday Night Football’ [will] probably be a lot more special to me,” Hamlin said.
THE EVENTS OF Monday, Jan. 2, 2023, will forever stay with Hamlin.
That night in Cincinnati, the Bills and Bengals were meeting for a key Week 17 matchup as the AFC playoffs loomed. The conference’s No. 1 seed was up for grabs.
Hamlin collapsed in the first quarter after making a tackle and was resuscitated with life-saving CPR administered by athletic trainer Denny Kellington. The entire organization and the public got behind Hamlin and the emotional impact was significant for all involved.
After stays at the University of Cincinnati Medical Center and later at Buffalo General Medical Center/Gates Vascular Institute, Hamlin continued his recovery process. Once he was medically cleared to return to football in April 2023 — after meeting with specialists in Buffalo and three additional specialists around the country — Hamlin says he took a day-by-day approach to get mental clarity needed to return.
Doctors determined the cause of Hamlin’s cardiac arrest was commotio cordis, which can take place when someone takes a sudden, blunt impact to the chest. Around 10 incidents are reported in the U.S. each year.
Hamlin says he decided to continue playing football not to prove anyone wrong, but because of the dreams he has always had.
“Football has always been my passion,” Hamlin said. “I never wanted to do anything else in my life.”
Hamlin began workouts with teammates in the spring of 2023. He participated in some activities, but without a helmet. The helmet returned in early June, and a first day in pads at a practice followed during training camp.
Before camp, Hamlin and head athletic trainer Nate Breske did tackling drills at the team’s indoor practice facility to get him some contact.
“There was a concern, obviously initially, in what would his play look like,” former Bills defensive backs coach and passing coordinator John Butler said on how Hamlin looked after the time away, “and we were obviously respectful of the process it was gonna take to go through that, but as he recovered in rehab, his play was to par, but we also knew that it was also going to continue to improve.”
Hamlin, 26, made it clear along the way that he understood the example he was setting, but does not want his cardiac arrest incident to define him.
“I thank everybody in this entire building from the top down for supporting me and giving me the space to allow me to heal and have my process exactly how I needed it to go,” Hamlin said. “It truly propelled me into allowing myself to be free this season. Last season was primarily just about healing and making myself do the hard stuff, thrusting myself into things that were uncomfortable, that made me fearful or gave me anxiety. But I was doing the hard stuff last year to make it easier this year.”
During the 2023 season, he played in five games with zero starts — and the snaps he did get were almost solely on special teams. Then in 2024, there was an opportunity.
The Bills’ starting safety tandem of the past seven seasons left. Jordan Poyer was released in the offseason — signing with the Miami Dolphins — and Micah Hyde became a free agent as he contemplated retirement.
Some of the competition the Bills brought in included free agent Mike Edwards, who missed most of OTAs and training camp with injuries, and rookie Cole Bishop, who missed most of camp and the preseason with a shoulder injury.
The team needed new starters.
The focus for Hamlin was on earning that starting spot in 2024, something that became clear to his coaches and those in the organization. According to defensive coordinator Bobby Babich, the takeaway from a meeting with the four-year veteran going into the year was that he’s ready “to just be Damar Hamlin the person and the football player.”
Hamlin took feedback from Babich and safeties coach Joe Danna and approached the opportunity with purpose.
“I just wanted to be able to continue my career and continue to develop, as a player that I knew I could be from before I even knew if I was gonna be able to play again,” said Hamlin.
Danna noted that Hamlin did a good job of taking the coaching they gave him and applying it to the field.
Hamlin earned the starting job thanks to his consistency over the offseason and training camp.
“I mean, what else can’t this young man do?” Bills coach Sean McDermott said before Week 1.
“It’s one thing to come back off of an ACL or a broken bone. It’s another thing to come back off of what he came back off of, right? Let alone just to decide to play football and contact football, right? In full pads at the NFL level …. I don’t think I need to say anything more.”
IN THE BILLS’ first “Monday Night Football” game of this season, the team built a 20-3 lead against the Jaguars at home. On first-and-10 from the Jacksonville 41-yard line with 4:28 left in the second quarter, quarterback Trevor Lawrence faked a handoff to running back Tank Bigsby, and then surveyed the field. A poor throw by Lawrence over rookie receiver Brian Thomas Jr.’s head landed in the arms of Hamlin, who ran across the field before being tackled.
“Man, it was special. We all know my last start on ‘Monday Night Football,’ and how that game went,” Hamlin said in the postgame news conference. “So to be able to come all the way back from that and to have a special moment like that, it’s all God right there. So, I’ve been giving him the praise like crazy lately … It makes all the emotions way easier when you just go out there and you think about, I just want to make plays for my teammates. It makes it all simple again.”
The moment was electric in the stadium and the entire sideline erupted. There was so much chaos during the celebration, Hamlin dropped the football before Rapp picked it up — a keepsake Hamlin would later give to his mother.
“I was late to the end zone when they went to celebrate and I see him drop the ball. I was like, ‘What the hell is he doing?’ Snatched the ball, gave it to him and he’s like, ‘Man, I don’t even know what I was thinking,'” Rapp recalled. “I was super happy for him, just man, just everything he’s been through, for him to come back like that on a Monday night when this happens, [I’m] so, so happy.”
The choice Hamlin made in running the pick back, well, could use some work. He noted that, while there are some coaching points he could take, it’s easier said than done when you see a 300-pound body shifting in the direction you are running.
“Terrible. It was terrible,” Babich said of Hamlin’s return. “… We had a wall set up and all of a sudden, he starts cutting across the field and we tell ’em, ‘You cut across the field, you’re on your own.’ But hey, it was his first one. Hopefully there’s many more to come and he’ll learn his lesson there.”
As far as plans for the next one?
“After getting the first [interception] off your back … it makes the second one feel a little bit easier to get,” Hamlin said. “So, I feel like it’s on the way. Hopefully Monday night.”
THE BILLS ENTER Monday night seeking to rebound from two less-than-ideal performances. Hamlin has played well at times, but mistakes and mixed performances by the defense highlight the safety group’s room to grow.
As for the Mondays that will follow, Hamlin says he’s focused on looking forward and taking advantage of the opportunity he has on the field. The safety is scheduled to become a free agent next offseason. For now, he’s intent on helping the Bills avoid a three-game losing streak.
“As tough as it is, as hard as the days are, as much as the grind as all of that s— like, as hard as it is to be in this league and have success day in, day out — the grind, the pain, the hurt of my body every day — as hard as this s— is, I’m still living my dream,” Hamlin said.
The incident from that fateful January night on MNF left Hamlin with a personal mission as well. He continues his impact off the field spreading awareness on CPR and the use of automated external defibrillators (AEDs), helping various communities that have touched him.
“There’s only one person in the history of the world that’s ever done what he’s done and to ever take that for granted is irresponsible,” Butler said. “… All of those hurdles that he overcame and then I’m sure he’s continuing to overcome because I’m sure that whole process never leaves you, so I just think it’s a level of mental toughness that not many people have.
“I admire everything he’s continuing to go through, and I think it’s just a blessing that he continues to have that type of impact on so many different people.”