Buffalo Bills: PFF defensive rankings from the 2018 season

The Buffalo Bills played well on defense for much of the 2018 season and had several players who stood out about the rest.

We recently took a look at how Pro Football Focus graded the Buffalo Bills offensive players.

Now it is time to take a look at the top-rated players on the defense.

Here they are:

Sadly enough, the highest-rated offensive player, Chris Ivory, only had a grade of 74.2. That makes sense given how much better the defense was than the offense all year.

The first name that stands out to me from the list is Levi Wallace. He didn’t play until the latter half of the season but once he was on the field, he made a name for himself. That is impressive considering the talent in the secondary.

Both Jerry Hughes and Lorenzo Alexander had great years and are both over 30 years old. I see that as a major key to this rebuild. Some teams strip the roster of veteran talent and go with all young players. But there needs to be some veteran talent and leadership to show the young guys the way.

Aside from the five listed, there are still guys like Tremaine Edmunds, Matt Milano, Tre’Davious White, Jordan Poyer and Taron Johnson putting in good work on defense. Kyle Williams also had an outstanding year in his final season.

The Bills are in great shape on defense in 2019. While the offense could use new talent at every position other than quarterback, the defense only needs a pass-rushing threat to strengthen the unit. As opposed to needing one to save the unit.

It will be interesting to see if the Bills surprise us and decide to upgrade the defense with that No. 9 overall pick, thus choosing to improve the offense later on.