What Happened to Terrel Bernard?

[BillMafia716ix]

He’s undersized. I don’t think he’s really anything special to be completely honest. LB is definitely a need in the upcoming draft. 

[Beck Water]

12 hours ago, WideNine said:

Settle, I was not a fan of his play on the line as he was too easily washed out with blocks and struggled to shed blocks.

 I wasn't a fan of his play with the Bills either, but he is making plays for Houston.

[GunnerBill]

5 hours ago, Johnnieo64 said:

We need a big, strong LB as well as some bigger DL men. A guy like Danny Stuntsman from Oklahoma would be perfect for us. I’m not saying that Bernard, Williams and Milano are not good players, but we need to supplement them with a bigger, stronger LB at the point of attack as these other guys are continually hurt because of their smallish size. He would also almost immediately become the leader of the D and make everyone around him better. I watched all of his games. He is really good. Just my opinion. Go Bills!! 😀

 

Confess I've only seen a bit of him but my worry is he has the Tremaine Edmunds weakness - he has never seen a play action or a misdirection he didn't want to bite on.

[GunnerBill]

11 hours ago, LABILLBACKER said:

"Hey Sean, if you ever want your adorable zone scheme to work, how bout you find game wreckers on the front 4"....then you can draft as skinny LBS as you want. Without a healthy Milano next to him, Bernard will struggle. When Matt was flying around looking unstoppable,  Bernard looked like a pro bowler. Now our entire front 7 is down.

 

Milano only played 4 games last year too. It is not the impact of Jones or Milano that is different. I just think teams have a year of film on Bernard, know what he does well and know how to explot his weaknesses. 

 

We should also just slow the roll a little bit. He hasn't played as well in 2024 as he did in 2023. But he hasn't been a liability or anything. If I was going to start a list of positions where the Bills could stand to upgrade in priority order MLB would be pretty far down it. Bernard is fine. I think last year he flashed potential that we might have thought he was better than fine and he has just regressed to the mean a bit.

[BADOLBILZ]

10 hours ago, GunnerBill said:

 

Confess I've only seen a bit of him but my worry is he has the Tremaine Edmunds weakness - he has never seen a play action or a misdirection he didn't want to bite on.

 

 

And because teams can make those June 1 designation cuts in March now, Tremaine will probably already be back in Buffalo before the draft anyway. 

[3rdand12]

On 12/26/2024 at 4:29 AM, Coach Tuesday said:

Installing a solid 2T would do more for this defense than any other factor.  They need one bad.

Good post Coach.

Get back to controlling the line of scrimmage between the guards. Whether pushing or penetrating. Let the quick side to side LB make plays off the Tackles. Thats the design with Milano and Bernard. Light and fast angles to the sideline

[3rdand12]

On 12/27/2024 at 1:37 PM, Alphadawg7 said:

This is a big part of the problem.  When you are undersized as much as we are in places in our front 7 it’s going to cause problems and inconsistencies.  You want to win in this league you better win in the trenches first.  
 

We are consistently winning in the trenches on offense but not on defense.  Which is why I sincerely hope we invest 2 picks into beef on the defensive side in the draft, grabbing at least one between our 6 picks in the first 4 rounds, if not both if the right guys are there.  

 

I think WR and DL should be the priority heading into the draft.  Obviously FA or Trades could change that, but as of now those should be our top 2 priorities IMO.  

I wondered about this whole Fast defense concept. If you have lite LBs and a lite heavy nickels ? You sure might do well do have a front that can fill the a-b gaps at least. And push the center  for pressures

[Simon]

A few weeks ago I saw him actually run over Dorian Williams (who was shockingly in the wrong gap) to get to a ballcarrier.

I think Terrel is just fine, although he did seem to be missing part of that chip on his shoulder for quite a while. He's been much better over the last month or so, imo.

[Alphadawg7]

15 minutes ago, 3rdand12 said:

I wondered about this whole Fast defense concept. If you have lite LBs and a lite heavy nickels ? You sure might do well do have a front that can fill the a-b gaps at least. And push the center  for pressures

 

True, and honestly, I don't think there is any scheme that benefits from being small up front.  

[BillsFanForever19]

48 minutes ago, Simon said:

A few weeks ago I saw him actually run over Dorian Williams (who was shockingly in the wrong gap) to get to a ballcarrier.

I think Terrel is just fine, although he did seem to be missing part of that chip on his shoulder for quite a while. He's been much better over the last month or so, imo.

 

Not to pick on you or anything bc I've seen this from a lot of posters on a number of players. And him being "just fine" isn't a ringing endorsement.

 

But you say Terrel Bernard is performing better in the past month. Gunner says the past couple weeks Ed Oliver has been performing better (clearly he did in Detroit). Kaiir Elam has staunch defenders saying he has performed well in the past couple weeks in Douglas's stead. 

 

Yet with all of these players supposedly performing better, the Defense during this past month has looked worse than it has all season. And by a large margin (save for Baltimore). 

 

I'm not saying Bernard is awful. I'm not saying it's all on him (as it could be Babich's scheming with him v. McDermott). But he was great last season. He was popping off the screen on a regular basis. This year, he's not doing that nearly as much and the middle of the field is a civ. 

Edited December 28, 2024 by BillsFanForever19

[3rdand12]

31 minutes ago, Alphadawg7 said:

 

True, and honestly, I don't think there is any scheme that benefits from being small up front.  

To be sure and agreed in todays NFL and to win the SB even

 I was not the one to describe our D line as such. But even by eye test

They get pushed a bit more often out of the play in the run game than I would prefer. Probably a combination of design players and by now , injuries

[Simon]

12 minutes ago, BillsFanForever19 said:

Not to pick on you or anything bc I've seen this from a lot of posters on a number of players players. But you say Terrel Bernard is performing better in the past month. Gunner says the past couple weeks Ed Oliver has been performing better (clearly he did in Detroit). Kaiir Elam has staunch defenders saying he has performed well in the past couple weeks.

 

Yet with all of these players supposedly performing better, the Defense during this past month has looked worse than it has all season. And by a large margin

 

It's a valid question, one I have been considering myself.

Several individuals really have upped their games over the last month, imo (Oliver, Bernard, DJones, Von). Despite that, teh D as a whole has not been better.
I think there are probably a few reasons combining to cause that. One is the level of competition and the Bills familiarity with it; having the Rams and Lions offenses back to back, both of which are good and neither of which the Bills see often created a couple high scoring games that really triggered this narrative. Losing 60% of the starting secondary and 50% of the starting LB corps and then seeing some of the backups backups also go out has created both continuity and talent issues on the field.

 

As for Bernard, I though he popped off the screen just last weekend. He was all over the place out there, playing like one of the league's best LB's.

[Beck Water]

3 hours ago, Simon said:

 

It's a valid question, one I have been considering myself.

Several individuals really have upped their games over the last month, imo (Oliver, Bernard, DJones, Von). Despite that, teh D as a whole has not been better.
I think there are probably a few reasons combining to cause that. One is the level of competition and the Bills familiarity with it; having the Rams and Lions offenses back to back, both of which are good and neither of which the Bills see often created a couple high scoring games that really triggered this narrative. Losing 60% of the starting secondary and 50% of the starting LB corps and then seeing some of the backups backups also go out has created both continuity and talent issues on the field.

 

As for Bernard, I though he popped off the screen just last weekend. He was all over the place out there, playing like one of the league's best LB's.

Yeah, the back end of the Bills D is designed to be 7 guys moving as one.  When you're playing 4 backups (one of them 3rd string and out of position) out of 7 as the Bills did against NE, it's a problem.  Lions, 3 out of 7 but Milano still de-rusting and of course went out and so did his backup.

On One Bills Live segment discussing the NE game with Greg Cosell , he expressed surprise that the Bills were playing Cover 0 and using pressure.  Brown pointed out that it was probably that with so many of their starters in the secondary out, they needed to play man to minimize communication issues in the coverage.

 

4 hours ago, Simon said:

A few weeks ago I saw him actually run over Dorian Williams (who was shockingly in the wrong gap) to get to a ballcarrier.

I think Terrel is just fine, although he did seem to be missing part of that chip on his shoulder for quite a while. He's been much better over the last month or so, imo.

 

I don't think it was the chip on his shoulder that was missing, I think it was a chunk on his chest.  

I thought Bernard came back from his pec injury very quickly.  2 games then back at 100% of the snaps, Are You Kidding Me? 

I think he probably needed about 4 just to heal up and then another 2-4 to come back to strength.  That would match with your "much better over the last month or so" observation.

Edited December 29, 2024 by Beck Water

[philholbroo]

Watching him I think he looks fine and its more situational. I think coaching is very worried about him staying healthy going into playoffs and is telling him to play down % a little bit. At least lately. As a leader of the D I think he has been fine.