The Buffalo Bills’ defense—long a unit generally regarded as one of the league’s best—saw uncharacteristic alterations in the 2024 offseason; the team hired just its second defensive coordinator of the Sean McDermott-era in Bobby Babich before parting ways with stalwart starters like Micah Hyde, Jordan Poyer, and Tre’Davious White in an effort to get younger and free up long-term financial flexibility.
The moves may ultimately have a larger impact on the heartstrings than they do on the field; Hyde and Poyer, though both still starting caliber players, are aging, while White has missed the vast majority of the past three seasons due to various significant leg injuries. The defense as a whole returns eight starters, with two of the three remaining starting roles figured to be filled by players who were with the team last season.
The team added youth to its roster as part of its offseason defensive tweaks, selecting two talented defenders on the second day of the 2024 NFL Draft. Buffalo selected Utah safety Cole Bishop in the second round before adding Duke defensive tackle DeWayne Carter in the third, adding potential long-term contributors in both the defensive backfield and in the trenches.
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Bishop has an opportunity to start immediately; the athletic defender—who notched 12 pass deflections, 7.5 sacks, and three interceptions throughout his time at Utah—joins a revamped safety group in search of new starters sans Hyde and Poyer, and though returning contributor Taylor Rapp already seems penciled into one starting spot, the competition alongside him is wide open. Carter, conversely, projects as a rotational interior defender immediately; he notched 12 sacks throughout his time at Duke, and Buffalo hopes that he can bring that juice off the bench behind the ever-stout Ed Oliver and DaQuan Jones.
Both players figure to factor prominently into the Bills’ long-term plans, but they must first cement their respective places on the depth chart by impressing throughout spring and summer workouts. The two rookies have performed as well as possible given the restrictions through this point of the offseason; during a recent appearance on the Centered on Buffalo podcast, Babich spoke about the team’s day-two rookie defenders, stating that they’ve positioned themselves well for training camp.
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“I’ll say this, they’re adapting well,” Babich said. “We like to target smart football players, and they’re certainly smart football players. Coming to the NFL is different. Everybody is good. I don’t care where you played in college, I don’t care if you go all the way from NAIA up to SEC, the NFL is different.
“They’re doing a good job adjusting, putting in the work that’s necessary to try to get them to where we need them to get to. I’m not putting expectations on them, we are literally day-to-day, drill-to-drill, meeting-to-meeting. [General manager] Brandon [Beane] did a good job of identifying some guys that fit what the Bills want. We’ll see where it goes, training camp will tell us a lot.”
It’s difficult for players (particularly in the trenches) to make an impact throughout OTAs and minicamp given the league-mandated practice restrictions; as Babich alludes to, fans will have the first opportunity to see how the two are making their respective impacts felt at this summer’s training camp, which commences at Rochester’s St. John Fisher University on July 24.
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