Addition by Subtraction: A.J. Epenesa and the state of Buffalo's pass rushers

While making a list of potential breakout players for the Bills in 2024, some picks would be fairly obvious. Dalton Kincaid and Khalil Shakir are great choices, but A.J. Epenesa shouldn't be much further down the list — and he'll be just as important to the teams success.

Last season, the Bills ranked fourth-best in team sacks with 54. However, their defense lost 10.5 of those sacks this offseason, most notably when Leonard Floyd, the team's leading sack getter in 2023, signed a $20-million contract with the San Francisco 49ers.

Instead of finding external replacements, the Bills are betting on in-house upgrades to make up for lost production.

Epenesa, 25, was the Bills first draft pick in 2020. After the team dealt its first-round pick to the Minnesota Vikings in exchange for Stefon Diggs, they used the 54th overall selection on Epenesa. But despite the heavy investment, the Bills have only started Epenesa in four regular-season games, meanwhile he's dressed in 67 regular season and playoff games over the past four seasons.

Epenesa failed to produce early in his professional career, but in the famous words of Janet Jackson, this is an article with a "What have you done for me lately" mantra.

Last season, Epenesa tied a career-high with 6.5 sacks and his eight passes defended ranked first for traditional defensive lineman across the entire NFL. Not to mention, Epenesa was the only defensive lineman to record multiple interceptions for the Bills in 2023.

And he did all of this as the Bills primary rotational pass rusher.

Last season, Greg Rousseau and Floyd were the Bills starters at defensive end, accounting for a combined 1,162 defensive snaps. Epenesa, on the other hand, only played 387 snaps on defense, only 36.1% of the entire season.

But in week five against the Jacksonville Jaguars, Epenesa was given a chance to shine when he played 59 defensive snaps — the most in a single game during his professional career, so far. And he certainly rose to the occasion.

Epenesa recorded the only multi-sack performance of his career, while batting down three passes and recovering his own strip-sack against Trevor Lawrence. In a gloomy game for the Bills, Epenesa was one of the few bright spots that made an otherwise unpleasant trip to London, England a positive.

So what's the point of all this?

It's actually pretty simple. While the Bills seemingly failed to address the loss of Leonard Floyd this offseason, their resigning of Epenesa — and his subsequent increase in playing time — could potentially be a sufficient answer.

Sometimes betting on a player to breakout, which the Bills are doing lots of this season, isn't the greatest course of action, especially for a team whose franchise quarterback is in his prime Super Bowl window, but for those Bills fans that are anxious about who's getting to the opposing quarterback in 2024, look for Epenesa to be a prime candidate.

Coupled with the continued recovery of Von Miller, who struggled to produce last season while he hobbled back from a torn ACL, and the hopeful resurgence of Greg Rousseau as a productive pass-rusher, the Bills defensive edges should be just fine.

If they're not, then general manager Brandon Beane could pull some strings at the trade deadline if the team is still within playoff contention.