Where was the defensive adjustment on Puka Nakua?

[PoundingDog]

Next season, we might get Nacua light (Coleman) and Kupp light (Shakir) with Stafford heavy (Allen) version for defenses to contend with.

[26TrapDraw]

19 hours ago, BillsFanForever19 said:

 

Saying Puka Nacua is "not that good" is absolutely ludicrous. In just a season and a half of NFL Football, he's accounted for 2,318 yards and 10 TD's. The guy was an All Pro last season as a Rookie. His 162 yards against us wasn't his highest or even his 2nd highest Receiving total in a single game in that only a year and a half of play. He's one of the best WR's in Football.

 

Should we have fared better against him and made adjustments? Yes. But if you weren't concerned about him heading into this game and believe he's "not that good" - you must not pay much attention to the NFL outside of Buffalo Bills football.

Yeah I'm guilty of not watching the rest of the NFL as closely as I follow the Bills and because he was hurt he disappeared off of my radar. He apparently is that good.

[frostbitmic]

They decided that instead of single covering him they'd zero cover him ... It was a bold but futile adjustment.

[BearNorth]

On 12/9/2024 at 5:33 PM, Miyagi-Do Karate said:

i actually thought Puka was more deadly when we were in man. 

Of course our 1st Round man defender - Elam was inactive, and our special teams got a punt blocked.  Smiley and McDermott have to own those decisions.

[Kelly to Allen]

I don't care what anyone says. More man covg with Elam would've been better. Not great but better. 

[Orlando Buffalo]

Nacua being a 5th rounder last year amazes me. He balled out and basically whenever I watch him play he impressed me. On three catches yesterday no one was stopping him from catching it because the defense on him was almost perfect but Nacua was just better. The only adjustment we needed was more pressure on Stafford. 

[billsfan714]

I was watching the fox show Shady is on this morning, one of the guys showed a play where Rams had 4 to one side, Bills have 2 defenders over there, was too easy.   It wasnt even a game plan, more of a concept of how to stop the Rams, never seen a team so utterly unprepared.

[LABILLBACKER]

2 hours ago, Kelly to Allen said:

I don't care what anyone says. More man covg with Elam would've been better. Not great but better. 

Good Lord...I actually finally agree with you.  Unfortunately Elam is our only man specialist.  It would be like changing from 4-3 to 3-4.  Our dbs are brainwashed into Sean's zone.

[Since1981]

33 minutes ago, LABILLBACKER said:

be like changing from 4-3 to 3-4

Yeah, 44 points. They could have done almost anything. I’d LOVE to see analysis on what the bills tried or didn’t to adjust. 

[Harold Jackson]

 

 

[Pine Barrens Mafia]

Defensive adjustment? What's that?

[Pete]

8 hours ago, LABILLBACKER said:

Good Lord...I actually finally agree with you.  Unfortunately Elam is our only man specialist.  It would be like changing from 4-3 to 3-4.  Our dbs are brainwashed into Sean's zone.

Benford rocks man coverage.  Dude is one of top CBs in the NFL

[Sargent Hulka]

On 12/9/2024 at 11:53 AM, 26TrapDraw said:

I sat at SOFI with 30k of our Bills brethren and watched this guy Torch our defense and Babich never made any adjustment to account for him. never slid help and I watched him find soft spots in our zone because there was no pass rush whatsoever.

Nakua is not that good and he looked like a hall of famer. The worst part is our zone is now exposed and teams have a blueprint.

 

Bills defense is dogshite. Secondary sucks, center of the D-line is a no-show, and the scheming blows.Please get rid of Babich; he is in over his head.

[Blackbeard]

The adjustments were made.  But sometimes you don’t have the personnel to match.   Pair that with perfect passes from Stafford, and Nacuas talent, and you see the result. 
 

Not everything can be blamed on coaching. 

[Doc Brown]

On 12/9/2024 at 11:59 AM, Simon said:

 

If your blueprint relies on a first ballot HOF QB playing one of the very best games of his entire career, then there might not be a whole lot of teams that can use it.

I knew somebody would crack the code of McDermott's zone heavy defense eventually.  It only took seven and a half seasons.

[Spiderweb]

On 12/9/2024 at 11:53 AM, 26TrapDraw said:

I sat at SOFI with 30k of our Bills brethren and watched this guy Torch our defense and Babich never made any adjustment to account for him. never slid help and I watched him find soft spots in our zone because there was no pass rush whatsoever.

Nakua is not that good and he looked like a hall of famer. The worst part is our zone is now exposed and teams have a blueprint.

 

Ah, you must not have been paying attention for some time. Nacua is that good..

[Sweats]

1 hour ago, Blackbeard said:

The adjustments were made.  But sometimes you don’t have the personnel to match.   Pair that with perfect passes from Stafford, and Nacuas talent, and you see the result. 
 

Not everything can be blamed on coaching. 

 

 

 

.........the terrible game plan was on coaching and that's where the game begins and ends.

[Solomon Grundy]

Was it possible for the Bills to draw their pass coverage towards Puka? Let Benford play man on Kupp/Puka and zone the rest of the field?

[dorquemada]

19 hours ago, frostbitmic said:

They decided that instead of single covering him they'd zero cover him ... It was a bold but futile adjustment.

 

  

[PoundingDog]

4 hours ago, Blackbeard said:

The adjustments were made.  But sometimes you don’t have the personnel to match.   Pair that with perfect passes from Stafford, and Nacuas talent, and you see the result. 
 

Not everything can be blamed on coaching. 

Not wrong. There are games where an opponent plays at an unexpected high level, how do you solve that? That's what McDermott/Beane and the Bills have not been able to overcome in the playoffs.

 

At micro level, meaning during the game where we found out that whatever we prepared cannot stop them, what do McDermott and his staff do? This is where some the measure of how great a coach is: adjustments. For example, if McDermott got a sense after a quarter or so that we were NOT going to stop Rams offense regardless the adjustment that we could do, maybe he should be more aggressive on offense like going for 4th down all the time while taking super aggressive and risky approach on defense like blitzing every down hoping for a big play. 

 

At micro level, OBD needs to identify the potential weakness of the team and find solutions. Overall I think they have done that where they had tried to improve the run offense to reduce the reliance on Josh so that the offense can be less volatile. After a couple years of effort, I think we see the result for that this year. They have to ask themselves the question: is it easier to make the offense go another level like able to score TD every possession to beat a performance like Rams had last week in a playoff setting, or it is easier to find ONE D player who is cable to rise up to make ONE or TWO plays to stop a drive or two when the RAMS are at that level of offense?