Thundering Herd - Buffalo Bills Team Thread

[LBzrule]

Buffalo Bills News and Reports

[LBzrule]

Week 1 Bills vs Ravens Post Game Interview


The Bills landed in Baltimore with a serious look on their faces. The defense got consistent pressure and the offense had their way with the Ravens defense. Interviewing Coach Harris after the game he had this to say:

Coach What went into the offensive Gameplan this week? The gameplan was simple this week. We really stayed with a lot of base because we didn't think they could stop it. So our mentality is that we will stay in our base until other teams get us out of it. We have a pretty expansive offense and we were happy we didn't have to use a great deal of it today. It's a pretty extensive season so we don't want to put all of our stuff on tape.

What about the defense, your guys seem to play pretty pissed off today? That's how we coach them. Like our offense we didn't do too much. We were able to pressure Flacco from several coverages on the back end. I'm proud of the way the defense played. That's a pretty good offense over there on paper. They have one of the speediest groups in the league and for us to get after them the way we did gives our team something to build on.

Overall, what are your thoughts on the team? Like every team, we have a long way to go. We've got to get better, and we will get better. We have a couple of easily correctable mistakes this game. Shady had two fumbles and there's just no excuse for that. He cost us a shutout there at the end with the fumble so I'm not happy about that. Tyrod threw one INT but it was a crazy play by Jimmy Smith. Perhaps that was a bad play call there. Other than that Tyrod looked in mid-season form.

I like the acquisition of Sammy Hill. He did a great job in Marcell's absence in 2 gaping the middle of the defense. It'll be interesting seeing them on the field together in some packages.

It was a good win for us. We're still building. We like our players. We believe in physical football, so we want to be the bully on the block especially defensively. A physical style of play is what we lean towards and there are a lot of things we have cooked up that we can't wait to show.

Defensive Player of the Game - Lareente McCray, 2 QB tackles
Offensive Player of the Game - Sammy Watkins, 6 rec, 75 yds 1TD

[LBzrule]

Week 2 vs Jets

The Bills had their home opener and head coach Alonzo Harris was found yelling but motivating the team after the victory. We caught up with him to get a run down on the team's performance.


Coach what was it that made this game seem so close? We had some things that we just cannot have. The offense moved the football at will, up and down the field. I don't think we punted this game but once, just like last game. Tyrod overthrew two easy passes on two third down scenarios which broke the momentum. We had some very poor clock management there at the end of the half. That was on me. Clay dropped an easy pass for a big gain. And we got down to the red area several times and walked away with FG's. We gotta push those drives in for TD's.


What about the defense?
Defensively we got after them a bit, but then we had a couple of straight coverage calls that resulted in pass interference calls. I think they had more pass interference yards than actually offensive production. We'll definitely fix that. Outside of that we had a couple of spotty tackling issues.

But the team did not get as many QB tackles this week, what went into that?
Well we worked with a new scheme this week out of the Odd. We actually got a great deal of pressure and forced throws and 4 QB knockdowns with it so we're happy with that. We're not looking for QB Tackles so much as forcing throws.

We are moving on to the Cardinals. It's a quick turnaround in this league. We're going to work on some ways of punching the football into the endzone. We cannot get down there and not punch it in.

[LBzrule]

Bills vs Cards



Week 3 vs Cards

The Bills hosted the Cardinals this week in a match up of two OG coaches from the days of ACQB. Both teams traded punches in the first quarter and it was a pretty tight affair. The Bill stalled out on the first drive with a well time Cardinals defensive pressure by Tyrann Mathieu as he took T-Mobile down for the QB tackle. The Cards got the football and walked right down the field for the score. The Bills defense had trouble with adjustments and how they wanted to align and defend the formation and it led to a huge breakdown in coverage. The Cardinals other big play on the drive was just a well thrown pass by Palmer to Brown that move them down to the 2 yard line. The Bills defense held up until 3rd and goal where the Cards passed it in for the TD.

The Bills move the football quickly back down the field and went up 7-6. On the next possession the Bills defense held suit and forced a punt and the offense drove the field and punched it in to go up 14-6. The Cards would not be done as the offense drove the field but two big QB tackles back to back forced the Cards to settle for a FG. From there the Bills defense would play lock down until the 4th QTR and the offense would do what it needed to do to chew clock.

We caught up with the coach after the game:

Quote:

This was one of those nervous games because you've played against the coach before and you know that you have to be prepared to deal with pressure from somewhere. I think we held up pretty well. Offensively we got after it pretty good this game. Defensively after a point we were just trying to get the game over with and try not to get anyone hurt.

[LBzrule]

Bills vs Bengals
24 - 15


The two top rated teams in the SFL squared off in Cincinnati and the game was one that was started prior to the season as the Bengals hired a new coach determined to "stop" Buffalo. The Bengals traded for Tavon Austin, perhaps destroying their future drafts, picked up another fast WR in Kenny Bell and at the end of the day, the Bills primarily kept their base roster in tact and the results would be the same.

The first quarter showed a pretty defensive game and the Bengals would strike first eventually with a FG. We caught up with Bills Defensive Coordinator to talk about the redzone success.

Quote:

We believe in playing strong redzone defense. It was a bend but don't break drive. We gave up some yards, but they did not get into the endzone. Our guys gave a great effort there to keep them to 3 points.

The Bengals front line gave the Bills Oline some big time trouble early in the game and T-Mobile did not have a consistent and comfortable pocket. But back up HB Mike Davis, signed off the Practice squad at the beginning of the season broke the game open for the Bills with a 30 + Yard run on a Read Option and from there the Bills Defense began to take over forcing Andy Dalton into multiple interceptions and keeping the Bengals off the board until late in the game.

Quote:

It was a great game. They pushed us a little bit. But our punches were more authoritative. They have a great defensive front, but we like our guys more.