Return of Milano, Edmunds Can’t Save Struggling Defense
What has happened to the Buffalo defense in 2020? The Bills were in the top-10 in defensive-efficiency rankings in both 2018 and 2019. While there’s still plenty of time to end up there by the time January rolls around, Buffalo is nowhere near there so far in 2020.
The Bills defense had another rough day against Jared Goff and the Los Angeles Rams. Even as the Bills built a 28-3 lead in the third quarter, the Rams moved the ball well, with running back Darrell Henderson in particular gashing the Bills.
In the second half, the Buffalo defense completely imploded. The Bills simply could not get stops. Four consecutive Rams drives ended in the end zone. Whenever Goff needed to come up with a big throw, he seemed to find it. Meanwhile, the run defense struggled to contain Henderson and also gave up big runs on end arounds by former friend Robert Woods.
Last week against Miami, Ryan Fitzpatrick and the Dolphins picked on the middle of the Buffalo defense, which was missing linebackers Tremaine Edmunds and Matt Milano, It was easy to blame the defense’s struggles on the absence of those two players. Both players were back in the lineup in Week 3, and yet the Bills defense continued to get picked apart in the middle of the field.
It’s likely that neither Edmunds nor Milano is 100 percent healthy yet. That may have been a reason for Los Angeles’ success. But the Bills need to figure out why Ram receivers were getting wide open downfield and why the Buffalo front-seven could not generate much of a pass rush.
Goff had too much time to stand in the pocket and throw, and too often, he had open receivers to throw to. The Bills also seemed to struggle with the speed of the Rams offense, which has been notorious for its use of misdirection and pre-snap motion under Sean McVay. Los Angeles quickly made up the 25-point deficit. The four Rams’ touchdown drives were 8-, 3-, 10-, and 6-play drives. Once the Rams got going, they became a giant snowball that couldn’t be stopped from rolling over everything in its path.
The biggest concerns for the Buffalo defense were the inability to stop the run or cover Rams receivers. It wasn’t one thing that sunk the Buffalo defense. There were many issues that need to be corrected before the difficult slate of AFC games coming up on the Buffalo schedule.