Coordinators Corner: The Bills' Underrated Defensive Line and More

Leslie Frazier made a rare opening statement to start his weekly Zoom press conference on Monday, just in case nobody would bring up the exemplary play of the Buffalo Bills' defensive line in a 31-14 victory over Carolina the day before or, really, all season.

Though none of the individuals have impressive sack totals for the season, they've been as good collectively as Frazier could have realistically expected.

"They played so well for us yesterday," the defensive coordinator said, "and they've done a good job for us throughout the year. And I just wanted to make sure that the audience understood that we're very supportive of our D-line. Really appreciate the work that they put in. I mean, we don't get to be the best pass defense in the league without the work that they've done. And as well as we've done on third down and so many other statistical categories, they're doing a good job."

Frazier should take comfort in the fact that probably nobody hadn't noticed the line, at least on Sunday, when it made former MVP quarterback Cam Newton look like ... Nathan Peterman.

Newton completed just 18 of 38 attempts for 156 yards and one touchdown against one interception. He was sacked four times.

Their inability to throw it made their healthy total of 151 yards on 29 rushing attempts meaningless.

In the end, Carlos "Boogie" Basham led the group with four tackles, former Panther Efe Obada contributed a career-high 2.0 sacks and Star Lotulelei added another.

Assorted injuries and a lengthy stay on the Reserve/COVID-19 list had forced Lotulelei to miss five games before Sunday.

"It's great to have Star back," Frazier continued. "That was a big help yesterday. It's good to see the maturation of [rookies] Greg Rousseau and Carlos Basham, watching those guys grow along with the development of Ed Oliver. And you have Mario Addison and Jerry Hughes there to kind of bring those guys along and help them. They're doing some good things and hopefully we can just continue to move forward and grow as a group.

"... I just wanted to make sure that the audience understood that we like a lot of things that our D-line is doing and have been doing throughout the season."

With that out of the way, the coach was able to go on to other areas. Here are some of the issues covered by Frazier and offensive coordinator Brian Daboll.

Harrison Phillips

The fourth-year defensive tackle with an expiring contract already has made a career-high 39 tackles in 11 games after battling back from an injury.

"He's just reacting," Frazier said. "He's not having to think about things. He's just making plays. ... He understands schemes, he understands how people want to try to block him, he understands our defense and he's making a big difference on the interior and creates more confidence for our defense having him out there on the field."

Missed tackles

"We take a lot of pride in our tackling and doing all we can to great negative plays," Frazier said. "We've traditionally been near the top of the league in creating negative plays on early downs.

"There's a little bit of give-and-take with us doing that. We've also had the missed tackles along the way, and we'll continue to work on and try to improve on that part of it. Because in order to be a good run defense, you've got to be a good tackling defense as well. ... We want to make sure we're getting guys to the ball and then, once we're there, making that tackle and not always leaning on that one guy to make the tackle but getting population around the ball to limit the explosive runs, in particular."

Gabriel Davis in the red zone

The second-year wide receiver not only leads the team in yards per reception (16.2) but has six touchdown catches despite having played just 45% of the offensive snaps.

"He's big and he's got a good catch radius and he's got good hands," Daboll said. "That always helps. ... He's a guy that's dependable. He does what he's supposed to do. ... But I'd say it's not just the red zone. He's made a lot of plays for us since he's been here. He'll need to continue to.

"I spoke about this at length during training camp. I have a lot of confidence in him in terms of knowing our system what's expected. But he's a great competitor for us, a guy we trust."

Devin Singletary's progress

The Bills have experimented with each of their four running backs this season, but Singletary clearly has emerged as the finest all-around threat and on Sunday was given a career-high 22 carries that produced 86 yards and his career-best third touchdown.

A big part of the team turning to him more has been his work in pass protection.

"He's done a really good job improving each year," Daboll said. "We do a lot in practice in terms of improving fundamentals, so the pass-protection work and the technique of fitting up into the gaps and — he's not the biggest guy, but he usually has pretty good leverage and usually plays with strong inside leverage on it. He's done a good job. You know, protection is a little bit more difficult in going from college to the pros ... and he's done a good job improving since he's been here. We have faith and confidence in him.

"You've got to be pretty smart back there. And there's a lot of different moving parts that these defenses give you nowadays. So you better know who to block first ... and to go out there technically and do that with good power and strength and leverage. And he's improved in that area."

Nick Fierro is the publisher of Bills Central. Check out the latest Bills news at www.si.com/nfl/bills and follow Fierro on Twitter at @NickFierro. Email to Nicky300@aol.com.

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