The Bills are poised to have a strong 2020 season. While the major additions the team made this offseason were on offense, it’s expected that the defense will keep on churning out success.
Buffalo has sported a top-three defense in recent seasons. That’s helped the team reach the postseason in two of the last three seasons under head coach Sean McDermott.
From top-to-bottom, the Bills have a solid unit. CBS Sports recently reflected that when ranking the NFL’s top-10 defenses.
The Bills landed at No. 4 in the list. Here’s the breakdown:
The Bills were already going to have one of the league’s better defenses in 2020 even despite letting Shaq Lawson walk and seeing Lorenzo Alexander retire. But then they replaced those guys by signing Mario Addison in free agency and drafting A.J. Epenesa, and so they should see little to no drop-off in their production up front. Add in some development from Ed Oliver — who looked like a monster as a rookie — and stabilization of the secondary by adding Josh Norman to a Tre’Davious White-led unit that was already quite good, and this team has the recipe to remain an excellent point-prevention unit.
While not in the top-three of the rankings, the Bills are rightfully among the best of the best in the NFL. The only three units landing above Buffalo are very good as well. The Patriots lost Tom Brady, but still have a good defensive side of the ball, landing them in third. The No. 2 49ers nearly saw their defense win a title in 2019. The Ravens landed at the No. 1 spot. Lamar Jackson has a good defense behind him, a group that got even better the the additions of Calais Campbell and Derek Wolfe in free agency and Patrick Queen in the draft.
But worth noting: there’s many upcoming opponents the Bills will have to face in 2020 on CBS Sports’ list. That might make things tough for the Bills on offense next season, putting pressure on the defense to preform as well. Such teams included in that grouping are the already mentioned Pats and 49ers, along with the Steelers (6), Rams (8), Chargers (9) and Broncos (10).
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