For every young kid dreaming in a small town, there is Josh Allen.For each athlete feeling invisible or overlooked, there is a 6ft 5in and 237lb quarterback who gradually evolved into the NFL‘s reigning MVP and the Buffalo Bills‘ best hope since four consecutive Super Bowl heartbreaks. Josh Allen is an NFL MVP candidate againgettyFrom small-town farming to NFL MVP “He (Allen) wants the ball in key moments of the game,” Buffalo head coach Sean McDermott said. “That’s what the great ones — that’s their mindset. That’s what they want, that’s what they do. And he’s never out of it in his mind.”It’s become normal for Allen — also known as the husband of actress Hailee Steinfeld — to record six touchdowns on a Sunday, then be the biggest name on an international broadcast a few days later.Allen’s Bills (7-3) travel to Houston to face the Texans (5-5) at NRG Stadium on Thursday Night Football. But there’s nothing normal about Allen’s rise, which started on a 3,000-acre farm in a small town of about 8,000 people, then saw the future three-time Pro Bowler forced to send out mass emails in the hope of landing a college football scholarship.“Hello coach, my name is Josh Allen and I am a quarterback at Reedley JC out of California,” Allen wrote.“(I) feel like I would be a great fit in your offensive scheme. Please have a look at my hudl. Please get back to me at any convenience!”A decade after Allen was posting his own junior college highlights — he had 79 followers and only followed one account — the face of the Bills ranks sixth in the NFL in passer rating (105.6) and completion percentage (69.6).Low-key vibes from Bills Mafia favorite Allen, a native of Firebaugh, California, is now one of the highest-paid players in the league, has a golf simulator in his basement, lists Kobe Bryant‘s ‘The Mamba Mentality’ as his favorite book, and met childhood idol Tiger Woods at the 2023 Genesis Invitational.But what stood out the most to Travis Clayton when he first met Allen was the humble, small-town vibe that has given the Bills Mafia its new Jim Kelly. Allen struggled to draw attention in high schoolinstagram@joshallenqbThe $330m QB has come a long way since his small town daysgetty“When I first came through the building, he introduced himself to me. He’s just an amazing person,” Clayton, who hails from the English town Basingstoke, exclusively told talkSPORT. Now in his second season on the Bills’ roster, the 6ft 7in and 301lb offensive tackle said that Allen is even more impressive in person. “Everyone can see from watching football on TV the ability he has is just off the scale,” Clayton said. “He is truly an unbelievable footballer.”But Allen only played in two games while throwing six passes as a sophomore at Wyoming, and his second season was better than his final campaign with the Cowboys in the Mountain West Conference.Buffalo traded up five spots with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers to take Allen at No. 7 overall in 2018.Ranking the best teams in NFL 6. Buffalo Bills (7-3)Don’t sleep on the Bills, who can still capture the AFC East.A Week 15 matchup vs the Patriots in New England could be must-see TV. talkSPORT ranks the best teams in the NFL Why was Allen boom or bust with Buffalo? Yet his NFL potential was teased as ‘boom or bust’ before the draft.“Allen’s film shows poor decisions and errant passes where the ball gets away from him,” Bleacher Report wrote in its pre-draft scouting profile. “His subpar completion percentage can be attributed to poor decisions, passes thrown too hard, drops and plain misses.”The Bills’ draft-day deal was initially followed by controversy after controversial tweets Allen sent in high school resurfaced before the franchise-changing pick.“He’s a really good kid,” Buffalo general manager Brandon Beane said.“We did a lot of background on him. Obviously some stuff came up today. We researched that, followed up with him. We feel very good about it.“We did our due diligence on him. We talked to him today. We spoke to him. We spoke to his coach again. We spoke to at least one of his teammates. Allen married Hailee Steinfeld in Mayinstagram@joshallenqbAllen has small town roots and grew up on a farminstagram@joshallenqb“I’m not making an excuse, but I know there are probably things I would probably be disappointed in myself that I did at 14 or 15. He’s gonna come in here and own it. That’s all he can do. He’s owned it. He’ll have to earn the trust of his teammates, the fan base and the organization. He’s done all he could do and he will have to do more when he gets here.”Buffalo still searching for first Super Bowl ring Baker Mayfield, Saquon Barkley and Sam Darnold would follow Allen in a 2018 redraft, while Buffalo has become dependent on the weekly strength of a 29-year-old QB who grew up on a farm that produced cotton and cantaloupe, and wheat, then moved to pistachios.“Whenever people ask where we’re from, we always have to say Fresno,” Josh’s mother, LaVonne Allen, told Yahoo Sports. “Firebaugh is such a small town that unless you work in agriculture, you probably wouldn’t know it. It’s very much off the beaten path.”The future NFL MVP bussed tables, drove a tractor and weeded fields during his youth. hudlThe reigning NFL MVP was forced to post his own highlight reel[/caption]“Josh and his brother helped us any way they could,” LaVonne said.“They could go out there and sweat with the best of them. If Joel (Allen’s father) asked them to get up early and get in the field by 6 a.m., they never argued and they never complained.”Allen has twice reached the AFC Championship, falling both times to Patrick Mahomes, Andy Reid, Travis Kelce and the Kansas City Chiefs.The Bills need a win in Houston to stay close with Drake Maye and the surging New England Patriots (9-2) in the AFC East.Then the kid from Firebaugh needs to complete a small-town Super Bowl dream that’s almost 30 years in the making. Stay up to date with the latest from the NFL across all platforms – follow our dedicated talkSPORT USA Facebook page and subscribe to our talkSPORT USA YouTube channel for all the news, exclusives, interviews and more.