What the Defense is really missing...

[Ridgewaycynic2013]

A foolproof plan and an airtight alibi.

[Thurman#1]

On 2/25/2022 at 7:27 AM, mjt328 said:

What the Defense is really missing...

 

 

Nothing, really. Or rather, they're missing whoever they lose over the offseason. If they lose Wallace, they'll be missing a #2 CB. If they lose Harry, they'll need someone to take his place. Same for Klein and a few others. 

 

They were a very good defense. They weren't missing anything.

 

The question is what they need to do to improve, and there are a lot of things to say there, as there are for any unit in the NFL, really.

 

 

On 2/25/2022 at 7:27 AM, mjt328 said:

 

Personally, I don't buy any of this.  We don't need to a complete overhaul.  We don't need to make a HUGE splash.

What the Defense truly lacks... is VERSATILITY.

 

This team has basically been running the SAME scheme for 5 seasons.

Four man pass rush.  Very little blitzing.  Zone coverage.  Strong tackling after the catch.  Bend-but-don't-break philosophy.

Brandon Beane has supplied the coaching staff with plenty of talent to run the McDermott/Frazier scheme.  Everyone on the roster is a strong fit.  The players know the system well, and are EXCELLENT at running it.  They are VERY fundamentally strong.  In fact, I think it could be argued that our defensive players peaked in many ways during 2021.

 

The problem is... the McDermott/Frazier scheme is NOT the best gameplan for stopping EVERY SINGLE team.  Which is why we have a tendency to absolutely dominate some opponents, and then struggle badly against others.  

• Our front 7 is generally undersized (partially by design).  Which means we often struggle against physical O-Lines and strong running teams.
• Some QBs are patient and can pick zone coverage apart.  Especially when they are expecting to see it all-day.

I also believe the main reason our defense has good "pressure stats" each year, but lack actual sacks - is because every QB/Offensive Coordinator plans short and quick passes against us.  A split second of hesitation (if they weren't sure what the Bills were coming with) would almost certainly result in more QB sacks. 

 

One of the reasons Bill Belichick has fielded a great Defense consistently (even without elite star power), is his ability to adapt and change depending on opponent.  Our current roster simply does not have the versatility to make those kind of changes week-to-week.  McDermott can focus on fundamentals, gap-control, staying mentally tough, etc.  But it's just a simple fact that Buffalo's defense does not match up well against some opponents (Indianapolis was probably the best example of this). 

 

To conquer the NFL playoffs and win the Super Bowl, we can't have games like Kansas City.

In my opinion, adding some versatility should be Beane's primary focus this offseason:

• We need to have a talented space-eater (0 or 1-Tech Nose Tackle) who can occupy blockers when we face run-first teams
• We need 1-2 cornerbacks who can switch between man/zone coverage as-needed

 

Bottom line.  There is no need to make drastic changes.  Just get the pieces needed to switch things up when needed.

 

 

 

 

I don't really agree with your overall theme, that they need to change to add versatility. Wouldn't hurt. Your post is really smart, but I'd quibble with the overall conclusion.

 

The reason they've been running the same scheme for 5 years is that their defense has steadily improved for the first few and then maintained a very high level from there onwards, with a few dips that appeared to be due largely to injury. You don't run the same scheme for five years, see it be consistently successful and figure that means we should change it.

 

I agree with most of your examples and smaller conclusions, really. I don't think we need more versatility or changes in emphasis. 

 

"The McDermott/Frazier scheme is NOT the best gameplay for stopping EVERY SINGLE team," you say? Yeah, dead right. 

 

But no scheme is. All of them have strengths and weaknesses, schemes and personnel they match up well and poorly with. It's how things go, not just in defense, not just in football, but in all complicated endeavors.

 

Belichick has indeed fielded a great defense consistently without star power. So has McDermott. McD hasn't had the length of success that the Dark Lord has, but he's absolutely had great defensive success without star power. And while Belichick's defense has been consistently excellent, they've had put-lenty of games over the years where the D was bailed out by having Brady running up the numbers on offense.

 

I pretty much agree with your last three sentences. I'm pretty sure we'll be running more zone, always, but shrewdly mixing up coverages to confuse QBs, as we generally do. I think we already switch things up a lot, but surely could continue to do more. I'd love to see a good space-eater, though when they figured things out, their removal of Taron Johnson for Klein ended up starting to work pretty well.

 

Having said that

 

They can and should improve. Every unit should. But the scheme isn't the problem, IMO.

 

Anyway, good post.

[corta765]

Gatorade

[Thurman#1]

On 2/26/2022 at 7:47 AM, mjt328 said:

 

I agree.  You can't judge a defense on a single game.  Certainly not a single series (no matter how poorly it was done).

 

You are right.  McDermott doesn't use the same gameplan every game, per se.

But he does have HIS system, and doesn't deviate too far from it week-to-week.

 

 

 

Josh Allen is the achilles-heel for a Belichick defense.  Pure and simple.

The Pats are built on game planning and preparation.  After that game (and the one a few weeks before), film showed that numerous times Belichick called the perfect play... only for Allen to break away from the pocket anyway and make a huge play.  

 

You can't expect to dominate every opponent.  But more can be done to match-up better against a wider variety of opponents.

 

 

 

Very much agreed with your first two paragraphs. But after that there's bunch of simplification.

 

You say that "Josh Allen is the achilles-heel for a Belichick defense.  Pure and simple." And that's wrong. It's just not that pure and simple. If it were they'd have played fantastic against everyone but Buffalo. And they didn't.

 

The Dolphins had a very solid game against them late in the year, 298 yards and controlling field position. The Colts had 275 yards and a very solid game, sealing the win with a spirit-crushing Jonathan Taylor 67 yarder. The Texans in a loss scored a TD above their average points and way above their average yards with 360. The Cowboys put up 567 yards and 28 points by the offense. The Saints beat up on NE's defense with their passing game pretty much tied behind their back.

 

And that Pats D really is very good. But they get beat several times a season regularly, always have. It simply didn't matter with Brady piling on the points.

 

Yes, the Pats had often called the right defense against the Bills but got beaten anyway. That's not all that rare in the NFL. It happens a lot. When you call the right defense you win more downs than you lose but you don't win them all. 

 

We did match up better against a wide variety of opponents.

[Thurman#1]

On 2/25/2022 at 11:03 PM, Ethan in Portland said:

We assume the playoffs because of Allen not McDermott

 

 

We assume the playoffs becauses of both. 

 

Justin Herbert is a damn good QB. So is Dak Prescott. So is Kyler Murray. So is Russell Wilson.

 

Matt Stafford certainly showed this year the difference between an excellent QB in a great environment and an excellent QB in a crappy one.

[Thurman#1]

On 2/25/2022 at 8:07 AM, Buffalo_Stampede said:

Bengals switched it up dropped 8, played single high. Took away Mahomes quick throws and his ability to make plays out of the pocket. 

 

 

They did, that's fair. But they also benefitted from a bad game by Mahomes. If he'd played that badly against us, we'd have wiped the floor with them.

 

Teams have dropped a lot of players out before against Mahomes and he's handled it better. He didn't this time.

[Tanoros]

On 2/24/2022 at 2:43 PM, whorlnut said:

I totally agree. People have the benefit of recency in determining that we need to add to the defense. I argue that the defense is pretty much loaded with really good to great players and wasn’t ranked number one by accident. 
 

This staff may be the best in the entire league in getting the most out of DBs. They made viable starters out of an undrafted FA and seventh round pick. That’s why I can’t for the life of me understand why we need a first round corner like most all outlets are saying. We can find a very good player in round 3 or 4 that would more than likely turn out to be an upgrade. 

Like you I trust the Bills staff to pick up quality corners wherever they do. However, and especially with Tre out to start the season, I see the rationale for corner in the first. 
 

if we picked up a corner in the first I’m sure that players starts from week 1 on and when Tre comes back, we’d have some very good outside CB play. Levi has had to be protected some, a more dynamic corner would need less of that, and allow the defense to do more things. 
 

Secondly (we’ll know more after free agency), it appears we should have an opportunity to pick up a good corner at our draft position.  Looking like need and BPA are lining up a bit at that spot. Out of most options at the end of round 1, it’s looking like a corner will make the most immediate impact. 
 

I’m very curious to see Beane’s approach to free agency, especially corner. How much does he spend, and who does he bring in. I think that might be quite telling. 

[Tanoros]

On 2/25/2022 at 2:54 PM, LABILLBACKER said:

Completely agree. We have a very good defense,  just not elite. I'm not going to get into the #1 ranking debate. I forsee Levi leaving and with Tre's return delayed,  this will probably force our 1st pick to be CB.  If we can get a 2nd or 3rd for Edmunds then I'd do that Immediately. We're stuck with Star but I could see us drafting a Travis Jones in the 3rd?  He could compliment Harry. I see all 3 of Addison, Hughes & Butler gone. I wish we could afford Chandler Jones but that's probably not feasible. Go more snaps with the young guys and see what you have?

You would be willing to move on from Edmonds at the price of worse MLB this upcoming season? Expecting to just replace Edmonds with better MLB isn’t very realistic, especially going into this upcoming season. Even a high profile rookie would likely not perform as well, and then we would be swapping out a good player for another, instead of upgrading a spot. 
 

If you want to see Edmonds gone, I think the best thing to hope for is his replacement is drafted this season, and takes over next year. Anything else is very unrealistic. 

[T master]

The Bills have the talent but i think the schedule last year had a little to do with the defenses rankings in some respects .

 

I have thought i would like to see a couple players changed up to keep the opposition guessing i have always thought even though Edmunds having decent stats each year is having to think to much rather than just playing to his athletic instincts .

 

I would like to see him play the position he did in college in a more traditional 3 LBer type D & pick up another MLB in the draft .

 

I would also like to see them put Oliver in a DE position every once in a while again to keep the other coaches guessing . They say he has a great first step i think he could be even more disruptive in certain situations if given the chance but i'm no football guru for sure that is just the fan in me talking with both of these players .

 

I would like to see them get a bigger nose tackle Star is if nothing else over paid & inconstant if they had the play that Jordon Phillips gave them while here this D would be elite with Oliver & a player that could give that kind of play next to him .

 

As far as BB having a D that can be more versatile he sure didn't show that in the games against the Bills last year even though he got his starters back from the year before .

 

The Bills are a player or 2 away from their goals I like you don't believe they need to tear down what they have just add to it & hopefully this draft & FA will help them & i have total faith in Beane to bring in those pieces to get the job done !! 

[2003Contenders]

While it may be true that the #1 ranking during the regular season may have been misleading, the truth of the matter is that on a week in-week-out basis, the defense was up to the task. I think it would be foolish to overreact to a couple of let-downs by the defense, the biggest of which (of course) was the Divisional playoff game against the Chiefs.

 

The defense was predicated on the bend-but-don't-break concept -- creating a scheme that minimized big play opportunities and forced opposing offenses to chain together a long sequence of plays to score. As such, the defense was heavily reliant on turnovers and negative plays, since the greater number of plays for opposing offenses also meant a greater likelihood for mistakes.

 

The biggest pitfall to this type of defense is that when the opposing offense avoids the big mistakes, they are able to effectively move the ball AND keep our defense on the field. That is what happened against the Titans, Colts and Chiefs. It would be interesting to go back through and see what the team's record has been under McD when the defense does NOT force a turnover. My guess is that it isn't very good. By the end of the playoff game against the Chiefs the defense was completely gassed. The offense (rather, the play calling on offense) also deserves some blame, as they went into hibernation through much of the 2nd and 3rd quarters of that game, which put the defense out on the field even more. Rather than pointing the finger at the defense, I am also inclined to give Mahomes and the Chiefs offense their due. Mahomes managed to avoid a great deal of pressure and made some clutch plays in that game. And, despite his effective play, Mahomes and the Chiefs only put 14 points on the board in the first half, so the defense was effectively working as designed (up to that point).

 

All of which isn't to say that the defense could not use some upgrades here and there:

-- A true impact player at MLB. I am not an Edmunds-hater, but it is hard to argue that he is a true difference maker.
 

-- Depth in the secondary. Missing T. White against the Chiefs really hurt -- and we enter the off-season with key contributors (like Levi) at CB.
 

-- A force at the Edge. While the rotation along the DL can be effective, we are missing a guy that opposing offenses must account for on every play. We have some youth here, so maybe one or more of these guys will pan out -- but I would love to see a legitimate 10+ sack rusher come in via free agency. Easier said that done, I know.

[ganesh]

On 2/25/2022 at 5:24 AM, machine gun kelly said:

I don’t listen to the noise, but I can see us not resigning Butler or Addison, we’re stuck with Star due to the contract, and let Edmunds play out his 5th year option.  No early contract.

 

As much as I like to wait for FA, I’m guessing Beane will take a CB in the 1st.  The question is there a top notch 2nd round space eating 1 tech DT we could benefit complimenting Horrible Harry?

 

These two additions would definitely benefit our defense.

 

Offense is for a different forum.

Star contract can be killed after June 1st by splitting the cap hit to two years.  Money we can save off Star and Morse's contract is quite big.   

 

On one of the "Locked on Bills Podcast". Marino had Greg Thompson on and he gave very good explanations on some of the cap dances that the Bills can do to generate 20-25 M in cap.   This does include letting go Beasley. 

[machine gun kelly]

On 2/28/2022 at 8:42 PM, ganesh said:

Star contract can be killed after June 1st by splitting the cap hit to two years.  Money we can save off Star and Morse's contract is quite big.   

 

On one of the "Locked on Bills Podcast". Marino had Greg Thompson on and he gave very good explanations on some of the cap dances that the Bills can do to generate 20-25 M in cap.   This does include letting go Beasley. 

I wasn’t surprised to hear the news about Beasely seeking a trade.  It just makes sense.  If Star is a post June1 hit, those numbers would be interesting.  There are two monster 1 tech DT’s, NFLR has been toting at the combine.  Whoever is the best talent at DT, CB, WR, is fine with me of one is graded higher than another per Beane.

 

One concern is Tre may not be 100% in September.