Puz Out; Can The Bills Survive?

Just finishing up some loose ends before I go to bed for the night. Here’s one that I came across much earlier: How can the Bills deal with the loss of Paul Posluszny?

Buffalo middle linebacker Paul Posluszny was having a nice night for the Bills as they continue to give the Patriots all they can handle (and more) in Foxborough. He had a team-high six first-half tackles and was plenty capable in coverage down the middle of the field against the Patriots’ crossing routes.

But now his night is over. It was just announced in the press box (and likely to the national TV audience) that Posluszny is done for the game with an arm injury.

The national radio broadcast said the injury was in fact a broken arm. If that’s true, he will likely miss a good chunk of time.

The Bills defense kept the potent Pats offense in check for most of the game, and as soon as Puz went down they started running more routes through the middle of the field. Notice who scored the two touchdowns? Ben Watson, the Patriots tight end. In the Bills cover-2-esque scheme, Posluszny would have been responsible for the deep middle of the field.

While the Bills looked better than anyone expected, the question now becomes can they survive without one of their defensive leaders? If you know anything about the cover-2, you know that an athletic middle linebacker has to be able to drop back and cover the deep middle for the system to work. Now, the Bills don’t have that. It would seem that we’ve discovered yet another possible landing spot for Derrick Brooks.

So, The Bills defense we saw today may have been an illusion.

Related posts:

1. When Did It Become Cool To Hate On Antonio Pierce?
2. Aaron Rouse Not The Giants’ Problem, It’s The Cover Two
3. Urlacher To Miss Season!
4. Can Texans Offense Survive Without Owen Daniels?
5. Observations From Saturday’s Giants-Bears Game