Buffalo Bills Have a Ready-Made Replacement for Leslie Frasier
By Kevin Devine
The Not-So-Secret Problem
While Buffalo Bills fans have enjoyed the run of regular season success that Buffalo has not seen in nearly 30 years, this has not translated to playoff success for various reasons. The collapses against the Chiefs in the AFC Championship game in 2020, again to the Chiefs in the Divisional Round in 2021, and the Bengals at home in the Divisional Round in 2022 all point to a big problem with the Bills’ current defensive scheme. In those three games combined, the Bills forced exactly zero turnovers on defense.
The problem is that a regular season scheme of waiting for the other team to make a mistake and trying to capitalize on that relies on factors that become much more difficult in the playoffs when you face the best teams, the best players, and the best coaches in the biggest situations.
This type of scheme is not aggressive and often prevents giving up big-chunk broken plays. However it also does not disrupt other teams offenses, create pressure and force teams to make mistakes. Patrick Mahomes and Joe Burrow seemed very happy to take what the Bills gave them, not make mistakes and take long drives that wore out the Bills’ defense and constantly put the Bills’ offense in long-drive situations with pressure on them to convert.
While Frazier did a lot of good things while in Buffalo and deserves credit as a big part of the Bills recent success, it is a good time for a change for everyone, as the Bills need to be looking for who can get them to the next level. So that leaves the question of who replaces Frazier in 2023?