Why The Buffalo Bills' Defensive Alignment Doesn't Matter

Fantastic analysis of our defensive scheme.

Sorry – my initial thought after just reading the headline. Awesome breakdown though – rec’d

Why does Merriman play SAM in the traditional 4-3 alignment?

Can you talk about the different types of 4-3? In other words, what are the fundamental differences between the standard 4-3, the 4-6, tampa 2, big 4-3 (Minn) etc. I know I get confused by all the variations sometimes. It’d be great if you could also talk about what the pros and cons of each defensive alignment are.
But, isn’t the bottom line, really, if you have good players, in almost any system, the defense will look good (or better)?

Learned a lot about Defense today.

This illustrates why you don’t want to change schemes and coaches often. You end up with too many pieces that don’t fit and it takes too long to fix. This year’s draft and free agency will determine that direction for years. No matter what, they have to get guys that can rush the passer and disrupt the passing game.

Does Chris Kelsay have his hand on the ground in this defense essentially making it a 5 man front? I was pretty sure he does but if you say he doesn’t I believe you.

This is exactly why drafting a True OLB is so important. If we can get a Lamar Woodley, Terrell Suggs type big strong and fast OLB we can Move Kelsay over with Shawne Merriman and just rotate them as pass rushers and allow our Strong side OLB to stay on the field regardless of scheme.

Courtney Upshaw should and better be our pick.

A couple of suggestions for the neos in the group : I think its easier to understand the changes (and imapct) from defensive alignment to defensive alignment if you reference the defensive players in your narrative – i.e. "Dareus shifts from strong side to weak side" with their number. ( I.e. Dareus (99) shifts from strong side to weak side..). Also, it would be cool to see the application of these schemes in various games. Like when Jets line up as X, we use Y. And perhaps discuss a little bit about the rationale? You want X setting the edge and want Y to have to go against Z. That kind of stuff. Lastly, this is really, really great stuff! I learn a lot.

Thanks

If they got a pass rusher in FA!

Wouldn’t it?

And two receivers! (counting Stevie J)

And Bell…..

Before the draft.

Wouldn’t that be awesome!?

Then nail the draft…..

We really would be a serious contender……

Go Bills!

Merriman in his prime.

Here’s the thing about the debate, though: it doesn’t matter.

Whatever it takes to get the W.

Why The Buffalo Bills’ Defensive Alignment Doesn’t Matter

I think you’re looking too much into this. :) The only reason it doesn’t matter is because we don’t have any linebackers that really makes this an issue for us.

The 3-4 is still preferred by me because of it’s versatility. You rush 2 OLB while the G/T is getting taken on by Dareus/Edwards and an ILB fake blitzs to hold the guard inside and all of a sudden you have a RB on a OLB which is better for the defense instead of our DE taking on a T 1-1. Problem being of course TE’s and NE has a few good ones.

I think the only reason it doesn’t matter is because our defensive players are so bad at the LB position it really doesn’t matter what we play – they’re going to be bad in any scheme as they’ve shown.

The good thing is that Dareus and Williams are going to be monsters in either a 3-4 or 4-3. They’re going to be DT’s anyways when we’re in nickel so staying strictly with a 4-3 when we’re been drafting for a 3-4 seems ass backwards to me. As long as we continue to draft for a 3-4 then i’m fine with it because of the amount of nickel.

There are advantages to a 3-4 from a pass rush stand point and that’s the Bills biggest defensive weakness right now. Going away from a schematic advantage on pass rush to accommodate a coach that Gailey likes even though we’ve been drafting for a 3-4 isn’t going forwards – it’s going backwards. Again.

The Bills need to pick a scheme and stick with it – this flip flopping is not helping our ball club. Then again, like I said, it’s not like our LBs are any good anyways. Our best LB can play in either alignment (with Barnetts speed he’d be a good WLB in a 4-3) but that should go away from 2 years worth of planning, development and drafting.

Thanks for the overview. That actually clarifies a whole lot.

Now if we can only sign Mario Williams, draft Brockers and Vinny Curry…

But I would like to see us draft players suited to play in a 3-4. and then pick up a 4-3 OLB in FA to take Merriman’s spot in your diagram. He wouldn’t be a full time starter, but it would allow us to use different schemes (hyrbid) and have players who can play them. It would give us great flexibility on defense to use certain schemes against certain offenses.

again top notch writeup from you. When does part 2 come out?

Also, would Upshaw fit the SAM position that Merriman plays in the 4-3?

The almost always played with at least one high safety, that precludes them from running a 46, I know it’s just nomenclature but if we’re into establishing what defense is going to be played I suppose we should get it right.

Also, Shawn Merriman is athletic enough to play any LB position in any scheme. Bryan Scott is not a better fit especially on the strong side, a position that requires strength and physicality. Scott’s strength is in pursuit and tackling, not taking on blockers and establishing an edge.

And the defense the Bills run WILL affect what they do from a personnel standpoint. They’re not going to draft a guy like Courtney Upshaw unless they play a version of the 3-4, because drafting him to play exclusively at DE or LB would be a waste because there a lot of players whom are better at those spots but none as good as he at doing both.

Personaly I like the hybrid fronts. IMO most teams play better against one defense or the other. Take our Bills for instance much has been made of our offenses quick start and then collapse. Most comments I have read blame this on injuries and the ability of the opposing teams defense to figure out out scheem (Chan is to predictabale). I Think both of these hold some merrit, but something that I have not seen discussed much here is that we played half out games this year against 3-4 scheems and half against 4-3 scheems. Would you be surprised to know that we were (4-4) against the four front, and (2-6) against the three front scheems? Would you be surprised to know that six of our huge seven game skid came aginst 3-4 front teams? Our offense actually does much better against the 4-3 with 28 average points per game. Compare that to the 18 average points per game aginst the 3-4 fronts and that includes the massive 41 point blow out aginst the not ready KC chiefs in the first game of the season. In fact our only two wins this year aginst the 3-4 defense (KC, Wash) had little to do with their defense and everything to do with the fact that they had no offense. On the other hand we did quite well against the 4-3 front teams scoring more than 20 points in all but one of those eight games(TEN 17). In fact we scored more than 30 points in four of the eight games. Our four losses to teams that play four front defenses came against the Bengals, Giants, Titans, and NE. We were competitive in three of those games losing by a combined 12 points before getting blown out by NE in the season finale.

My point is I think scheem does matter. I also think by playing the defense we play, we can(with improved talent added in) take advantage of each teams tendncey for weakness.

DJ I have a couple of questions. How do you distinguish strong and week side aginst a team when they are in a two tight end set like NE runs? Would you care to elaberate on what scheems we ran more than others against the three teams in our conference? I would think we ran a lot of Nickel aginst NE but how did we choose to cover (or in the last game not cover) their two TE’s, and what did we run aginst the Jets and Miami?

After reading all this, it is shocking to me that people still want to complain about scheme. Like I said when the Stach was promoted…..

Bottom line is we need better players and coaches who know how to use them. The 3-4 and 4-3 systems we are talking about are so similar it doesn’t make much difference personnel wise. Why are people totally discounting the advantages to being flexible defensively? …….

by Joe P. on Jan 2, 2012 6:19 PM CST up actions

I am sure you will get into this next, but another advantage of running a hybrid is it allows for flexibility……flexibility when drafting, trying to land quality free agents, and dealing with injury. It allows the coaches to put the best front 7 defenders we have on the field and adjust the defense to maximize their talent. Of course, this is also highlights my biggest concern. After the Maybin fiasco and the way Moats has been jerked around, I’m not sure the Bills coaches have that ability. Let’s hope that is what got Edwards fired.