ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. — If you wanted clarity about what happened between the Buffalo Bills and Stefon Diggs and the apparent rift that led the team to trade the star wide receiver, Josh Allen and Sean McDermott took the high road instead.

In their first public comments about the situation since the Bills sent Diggs to the Houston Texans earlier this month, the quarterback and head coach offered nothing but praise for Diggs on Thursday. 

"Definitely hard to part ways with a guy that’s been very instrumental in our success here over the last four years and I can’t thank him enough for when he came in and how hard he worked and what he taught me along the years," Allen said. "I wish we can keep everybody. We’ve made a lot of changes this offseason. We’ve lost a lot of veteran leadership. Stef being one of them."

"We’ll miss him," McDermott said. "You never replace a player like Stef Diggs. We wish him well, Stef and his family. Hard to move on from a player like that. Now we go back to looking at our roster and excited for the opportunity for the guys in that room that we have to step up."

McDermott said he did not feel that the speculation surrounding Diggs' happiness or displeasure with the organization over the past year or so weighed down the team at all. 

For his part, Allen believes he has learned about managing relationships with teammates and leadership going into his seventh season in the league.

"It’s an opportunity for myself to grow as a leader and to bring along some of these young guys or new guys that we’ve brought into our team," Allen said. "That’s an opportunity that frankly I’m very excited about. It’s something that’s going to be very challenging but I’m very willing to do it."

Allen told reporters he exchanged text messages with Diggs after the trade went down, sharing gratitude for Diggs helping him become the player he is today.

Now, Allen will have to prove that player is one who can continue at the highest level without his top target of the last four years.