Bobby Babich Breaks Down the Bills’ New Look Defense with Eric Wood

Bobby Babich Breaks Down the Bills’ New Look Defense with Eric Wood

welcome back to the Center on Buffalo podcast this week we are joined by Bill’s defensive coordinator Bobby Babich we had him on this time of the year last year and Bobby had just taken over as defensive coordinator and we had an awesome conversation so if you haven’t listened to that one you can go back and hear that one a little bit more about his story we had uh Joe Brady on recently go check that one out if you haven’t heard that one and this episode is brought to you by Danos Seasoning they have their new 13p pack out you can go to the link in the show notes to go get you that for 65 bucks you get to try all 13 of the seasonings everything but the new Outlaw seasonings those have a little sugar in them but they’re good but go check those out uh at the link in the show notes just 65 bucks to try all 13 of them yum yum get you some enjoy the podcast and go Bills hit us up on all social media at the Buffalo Pod bobby welcome back on the podcast brother thanks Eric it’s great to be back and uh you know hopefully I can do a little better job this year on your podcast oh shoot you crushed it last year one of the f But one of my favorite things is one of the first texts I got after the podcast was released was from your pops which made me uh so happy i always love catching up with him before games and whatnot and we talked last year about how he’d send you little notes after games and he’s sitting there with his little notebook and he send you those so as defensive coordinator for the first time last year is he is he questioning those play calls after the games no he’s not he He’s not questioning play calls but he certainly wants to know about the execution of the call you know so like I said he’ll still have his no card and he knows exactly you know it’s pretty interesting he does a pretty good job of being able to watch a TV copy as you know O lineman you know it’s a little bit you’re more honed in there but he can kind of get a feel for it so um no he’s still he’s still uh asking about the execution of certain calls and things like that so no that’s awesome and that’s an asset as long as he’s been around the game and he coached in Shawn McDermott’s defense which has very many similarities to the defense that you called last year so that’s that’s an asset to have behind you i just got a huge kick out of that and when when I got that text from your pops I was like “Oh I love it i absolutely love it.” All right so I’m sure I’ll listen to this one too Eric so no doubt well I I’m going to send it to him directly now that I know he’s tuning in so yeah there’s there’s no question about that how do you feel about the defense coming out of the spring heading into this little break before training camp yeah you know they we put in a lot of work um every year you’re going to add some wrinkles here or there but couldn’t be happier i mean the effort that they put in um the way they approached this spring the execution and the corrections that we made you know they were very intentional and you know they they got a lot of pride in the way that we play defense here in Buffalo is there ever times at OTA practice or even training camp practice where you execute well defensively but number 17 just makes the play and you’re sitting there in meetings and you’re like “Well that’s a little different dude.” So and I’m just thinking of that because there were times where our defensive line had Mario Williams Kyle Williams Marcel Darius and Jerry Hughes was blowing and gone at that point of his career and there’ll be times where there’d be some pressure on the quarterback like “Yeah this is a pretty rare defensive line might not look like that in the game does that ever happen in in practice with 17?” Oh yeah there’s no doubt i mean even you know I remember back even when he first started here and I was coaching the safeties like he would do some things just that were very unique you know compared to to you know having been in the league as long as I’ve been in the league very competitive very competitive you know so but yeah absolutely i mean he’s the MVP you got to give him credit where credit is due and sometimes the execution is on point and 17 as as you know all Bill’s mafia he’s every week he can make it pay i’ve heard defenses talk about him and there’s others like this in the league but you got to be ready to defend the entire field he can take the top off the defense he can throw the deep ball he can take the short stuff he can run the ball himself he can manage the offense get them in the right play calls the run plays and you just got to be ready to defend the whole field with him which is part of the reason why he’s MVP and the Bills set a franchise record for points in a season last year and so that that can make it tough but like I said I know there’s others i’m going to get some backlash hey Lamar can do it mahomes can do it i I know that i I do know that uh all right so the probably the biggest name coming in in free agency this year is Joey Bosa and I understand he was nicked up this spring not a concern of mine guy with that much experience you know he he could not show up the entire spring you feel pretty confident what he can do rushing the edge but what type of difference maker can he still be at this point of his career when he’s healthy yeah you know Joey Joey’s a very technical rusher um and as you said you know a little nicked up so we didn’t get to see you know the things um that we necessarily wanted to see but you know things happen and and he was here every day uh this spring credit to him wanted to get to a the most important thing is to know his defense or to know his teammates excuse me and then know our defense and get acclimated to this environment and this culture and all those type of things but no I mean Joey Bose is a proven guy um I know he had I can’t remember what year it was but he had a pretty good game here in Highark Stadium a couple years ago uh you know and and uh just really excited to get him out on the field you know he he brings hate to say it but statistical you know pluses for for defenses and those type of things but he’s totally bought in and can’t wait to see him once we get to training camp and I know he’ll be ready to go yeah I’m excited about it too he’s a guy he we played him young in his career back in 2017 y and and he was a differencemaker they had him and I think it was Melvin Ingram was still there on the other side and that was a that was a pretty tough duo out there on the edges for our tackles we got we got lit up in that one but um anyways that was the Nathan Peterman game out in LA yes we we’ll uh we’ll get past that one quickly we’ll choose to move on from that we’ll get past that one uh quickly all right one of the guys that we brought in this off seasonason that I’m really excited about a guy who I’ve noticed on film on broadcast we played against the Rams last year was Michael Hoy and and just his position flexibility so how excited is a defensive coordinator do you get when you bring in a guy like that where you’re saying “Okay we could literally play him on almost anywhere on either of the first two levels of the defense.” He’s been a guy and I’ve said it before that we’ve looked at for a couple years um you know he went through I think the restrictive free agency before and some of those things you know you do your due diligence for all the guys he could potentially target but unique skill set um I think the thing that differentiates him is his energy and his physicality um extremely smart he’s he you could tell he played in the Ivy League um but really excited about having Hoy um you know not only is he a really good player he’s a really good dude and you know we’ll see you know what what we can do with him yeah yeah his physicality stands out when you watch him as as a former offensive lineman like we don’t love those guys that you can move around so now we all got to prepare for him he could play the three technique and get on the edge he can play kind of offball linebacker outside those guys are tough for us to deal with because we all have to prepare for him and then he brings the physicality piece like you’re not getting a play off on second and eight where it’s like eh we’re going to pass it maybe they think it’s a run you’re not going to get a whole lot here he’s the type of dude that he’s coming each and every play so excited to get him in the building and on our squad this year all right I’m going to switch gears a little bit we’re going to go to a guy who um I played with you coached personally in the room Matt Milano he has a healthy off seasonason so how great is it to see him back out there this spring with the spark back in his step yeah I’m really happy for Matt i mean you know last year I know was tough on him it was tough on him um you know and it wasn’t anything you know Matt Matt’s a ultimate pro he takes care of his body um he makes sure that he’s ready to go you don’t you don’t have to question whether Matt Milano is going to be in shape or anything of that nature and um you know it’s it’s really good and I think like anything Eric as you know even on the offensive line when you have a guy playing next to you and it’s a consistent deal and you talk about him and TB or even just the linebacker room in general um you know there’s a camaraderie there there’s a there’s a um there’s a feel for one another that you develop and I think that’s really important and look the biggest thing for Matt I’ll never put expectations on players um the biggest thing for Matt is just being able to stay healthy and to see Matt having fun with with the availability piece and and uh um we all know what Matt Milano can look like when he’s healthy and in a rhythm and and hopefully you know we get that yeah we saw more of that towards the end of of last year and you know it was just it was honestly tough on me to watch at times from the booth where I’m like Matt makes that play nine times out of 10 and I’ve been there coming off an ACL before i’ve been there coming off a broken leg and whatever it is and it’s just like it was it was tough for me to see and I was I was so glad to see it come late in the season finish the season healthy so that he’s not heading into the offseason with another surgery or whatever it be so I I was excited to see him out there and and you know I’m seeing clips from OTAA practices but looked like he’s got that bounce back in his step which is great to see he certainly does sick moment to hear from one of our sponsors and that’s Water Boy you’ve heard about him on here often best electrolyte on the planet in my opinion this is my favorite it’s the workout hydration and these ones have a little bit of glutamine in them they have a bunch of sodium replenish you after your workout give you all those vitamins minerals that you need when you break a sweat it’s also great to just have first thing in the morning get that cellular hydration in that I always hear about on my podcast those health and wellness podcasts and so go check them out use code ewood for 20% off and the links in the show notes okay so a young guy who’s who’s not dinged up you know it was revealed I guess he had a little hamstring deal or whatever but Maxwell Harrison he’s got that spark he’s got that juice he’s he’s young he’s coming out of Kentucky i got to see him play against my Cardinals we got a bunch of Kentucky Wildcats on the roster now two drafted this year on the defensive side of the ball what’ you see from Maxwell this spring yeah it’s interesting you know if you go back you’re talking about your Louisville Cardinals the great thing about that game is they kind of went after Max early in the game if you watch if you watched the game oh I I heard about it yeah chris Bell makes one play down the sideline on him that’s right that’s right so they kind of went after him which was good and and look it’s the NFL he’s going to face adversity and then to see in that game as we went through evaluations to see him bounce back and really in the second half came back and made a lot of plays in that game was was um was tremendous but no I mean Max is a young guy he’s a heck of a dude which as I say before Sean and Brandon do a great job uh within the valuation piece of finding the right pieces for our culture a lot of energy a lot of god-given ability um you know and I think I think I said it before in my press conference you really you saw Max for him it start to click you said you know he faced a little adversity in the last practice um excuse me or second to last and he’ll be I’m sure he’ll be good to go around training camp um but uh you know he he he certainly provides a lot of youth and energy and God-given ability to that secondary all right so you got three new defensive linemen uh added via the draft tj Sanders Landon Jackson and Dion Walker what would you see from those guys this spring yeah you know really what what you saw was a little bit like Max you saw you saw the guys that the ability to cut it loose they’re all very conscientious uh people um they want to do their job and they want to do do it at a high level and um I think what you saw was you know for any rookie it’s the evolution you remember back to your rookie year it’s like “Oh god I don’t want to screw this up to the point where it’s okay here we go i feel good let me cut it loose.” And and that’s what we saw which is what you want to see out of rookies going into training camp all it is is building confidence i’ll quote the the I’ll quote excuse me Micah Hyde confidence is a dangerous drug he said that a long time ago in a press conference here and um you know we’re starting to see that incre incremental uh build of confidence which if you have confidence in this game as you know Eric it’s it’s it’s just freeing it’s freeing i know what I’m doing and even if I don’t execute to the to the nth degree I know my confidence and my ability can pull me out of that but that’s really what you saw out of those three yeah that’s good yeah I remember so it and I asked that in and when I was prepping for this I was like I I understand that especially on the O line and Dline during OTAAS there’s there’s just that fine line yes we’re working on our hands and feet i always say offense and defensive linemen get really good during OTAAS if you’re a good enough athlete you’re putting in the work with your hands and your feet because you learn to stay on your feet you learn that I can’t just momentum block guys in the NFL i can’t just bury into someone every time as a defensive lineman and so yes you you have to take some of it with a grain of salt but I I remember my you talk about figuring it all out my first OTAAS I’m going against Marcus Stout every single play so I’m at right guard Andy Levit’s at left guard Kyle Williams going to be on his side and they just our defensive tackles never moved they played both played the one and the three and Marcus Straoud jumped the bat down a pass well I’m fully engaged with him and my instinct went off and I dumped him i mean 67 335 maybe more at that time of the year yeah i mean I apologized i mean I picked him up because that’s a dude you didn’t want blowing and going during OTAAS and he wasn’t he was kind of standing at the line he jumped i was like “Dude that’s completely on me.” I picked him up as fast as I could we had a good laugh about it marshawn Lynch liked it a little too much when he saw it on uh film that day but no he never let Marcus hear the end of it when we got back to the locker room I’m like “Dude you’re gonna get my butt whooped out there if you keep talking talking smack to Stout about this.” But we had a good laugh about it but I learned quickly you don’t put down a veteran uh during OTA and I promise it wasn’t intentional all right here we go running back production was up across the NFL last year and it’s kind of been trending that way these last couple years but last year I mean if you look at fantasy numbers it just it was up tremendously do you feel like that’s a trend that we’re going to continue to see in the NFL yeah I I just think the NFL in general is cyclical you know it it takes on trends as it goes um offensive guys um as the defensive guys like to say are a lot of copycat type guys so you know I think you know the game is cyclical you got to protect your quarterbacks the best way to protect a quarterback is to have a run game you know and I think even with the progression of the pass game you know involving the backs more and then the identification of pass catching backs um is becoming even more and more evident you know as as it’s a whole you know trend of you know you’ve got these mobile quarterbacks do you want to pressure him if you don’t want to pressure him do you want to go with a fourman rush do you want to play split safety what kind of coverage do you want behind it well now the backs have got to be out and they’ve got to be a factor as a whole NFL trend so it’s a back and forth between offense and defense and I think what people are realizing is is that not only in the run game clearly with running backs but in the pass game it’s you know they’re becoming more and more evident as long as you don’t have to keep them in protection and those type of things so does the split safety so now you have essentially two guys deep so that and this is this is me asking not not telling right is that is that freeing up the running backs for those checkdowns because okay now your middle linebackers like if you’re playing zone got to get a little bit deeper okay so now there becomes your check down there in the middle yeah i mean anytime you go to split safety it’s just it’s just uh it’s just a math right so if you’re in four if you’re in a fourman rush and you’re in split safety depending on what type of split safety um you could potentially have four deep which if you just do the math to 11 it only leaves three underneath you know if you go to single high you know a little bit different you got three deep fourman rush and now you got four underneath so you know it’s just a it’s just a common thread of you know how you want to approach things that week you know depending on what your schedule looks like who you’re going against um what the offense is trying to present and you know you’re just going to try to put yourself in the best situation defensively possible um to take away what they do best and and uh you know obviously running backs become a big part of that and I know you know my son’s playing quarterback he’s a freshman in high school and in my head I’m always like know where your checkown is know where your is know where your outlet is know where your outlet is you know so all that goes into a fact into factor and and uh you know so it’s a little bit of a cat and mouse game for sure that’s good stuff all right so I know you came into Highark Stadium as a defending coach um throughout your time in the league before before joining the Bills what was that drive to the stadium like was were you all getting heckled pretty good i I see some stuff on social media when you had come in were you guys getting heckled pretty good by Bill’s Mafia you are you saying when we played here uh when I was on an opposing team yeah correct yeah i mean it’s it’s funny uh you know when you get free agents um and let me say this this is the best i’ve been in this league i’ve been in three organizations i’ve been to mostly every stadium um and this place is so unique it is i mean Bill’s Mafia there’s nothing like it they are tremendous um you know I know not only the coaches but the players take a certain pride in making sure they put out the product for them as you did Eric and you know this and yes to answer your question yes um you know getting heckled all those type of things but it’s even when you talk about I’ve been here this will be the ninth year so don’t take it for granted but you’re just used to Bill’s Mafia well you get free agents that come in and you’re like you know they they’re they’re excited to be a part of it and they like to tell stories of you pull in and you’re like “Wow,” you know and how they get heckled and you know all those type of things but uh but no yeah definitely Bill’s Mafia they know you’re the visitor they know you’re the enemy and they make sure they do their due diligence and letting you know you’re the enemy oh yeah they know that route to the stadium they know about what time that you’re going to be pulling in as a visitor and they’re going to give it to you pretty good and you also got to tell the free agents all the time or the new guys that are coming in okay I know we only have to get there by 11:00 a.m but I would shoot to get there by 9:45 because you might hit an hour or so of traffic trying to get to the stadium and it’s it’s different for these guys to to come to Grass Swiss because you play at least one game in the preseason at High Mark well you get in your you get in your head okay I need about 30 35 minutes from the team hotel or from a house or whatever it is and then it’s completely different on game day completely yep uh last last season at Highark Stadium do you have a favorite memory from Highark Stadium it doesn’t have to be a game it could be something family-wise whatever it may be do you have a a lasting memory so far maybe there’s a new one that’s going to happen this year in this final year but as of right now do you have a lasting memory of High Mark Stadium there’s probably two um that just popped in my head right now it was pretty cool when um I think Shawn called timeout kyle Williams was retiring and the whole sideline you know erupted and the whole stadium erupted that was pretty cool kyle meant a lot to this organization still does and uh you know he was definitely part of the culture shift and when you when you talk about the culture shift um I think also was pretty unique for me obviously I’ve known Jordan Puyer for a long time and you know him and Micah have become family to us at this point um and I think I think people kind of knew that it was coming to an end with those two and I think the last home game which would have been 20 23 2023 uh when they did starting lineups those two got introduced together and it was it was pretty unique it was pretty cool experience that was really special i I enjoyed that one all right we’re going to get to the rapid fire questions now those are brought to you by Danos Seasoning have you tried Dano seasoning before oh yeah i got it in I got it in my cupboard okay my man absolutely danos great seasoning yes sir yum yum get you something all right what player that’s currently on the defense right now would you think is most likely to be a coach one day i’m going to go with uh Michael Hoy he’s made it clear of his intentions i love it i love it all right hard Knox is coming in have you ever been around um a training camp or or any inseason whatever where training uh Hard Knox was involved never what are your thoughts on Hard Knocks coming in um [Music] it’ll be fine it’ll be fine it’ll be fine the Bills are the Bills you know we got nothing to hide and we are who we are i love it i love it all right what’s your favorite date night spot in Western New York with uh Lacy the Grange hands down the Grange um been going for years we usually get a um reservation every Friday night during the season all the way up to the Super Bowl now you’re going to have a a line of fans lined up outside the range waiting for you now you’ll have your prop out there i don’t know about that but no great food oh yeah oh yeah they do an awesome job all right last one for me who would be your top artist to see in concert right now i just missed Stapleton the other night where it’s the state championship for softball so I just missed Stapleton got to see George Strait i would have to say either recent I’m really getting into the Red Clay Strays um like them i think their lead singer has a tremendous voice and then I’m a big music guy and then my all-time favorite um the guy that gets me going before games is uh Lil Wayne so I like it i like Lil Wayne i think he’s very talented um would love to see him in concert one day what’s your favorite Lil Wayne song well we got two um so the whole Babage Clan before games to get themselves going we listen to Lil Wayne and it’s either a Millie or 6’7 i love it i love it hey enjoy a little uh downtime this summer get some time in with the family you guys booked up with uh sporting events and whatnot this summer whole summer we got a summer of softball and uh you know my son’s a high school footballer so we got to do all that i love it i was just talking to Joe Shane his son’s starting his freshman year and you know it’s okay now we can’t be gone for four weeks anymore we can’t you know go sit down in South Carolina or whatever it’s it’s uh it’s hey it won’t be like this forever though so enjoy these moments soak it in i know you know that but enjoy the downtime for a little bit and I appreciate you coming on the podcast as always brother absolutely thanks for having me man yep you’re the man

Bills Defensive Coordinator Bobby Babich is back on Centered on Buffalo! Eric Wood and Coach Babich talk about the evolution of Buffalo’s defense, what it’s like preparing for Josh Allen in practice, and the new additions like Joey Bosa and rookie standout Maxwell Hairston. Plus, hear Babich’s take on Matt Milano’s return, who he thinks could be a future coach, and his go-to pregame music. Don’t miss this inside look at what’s ahead for the Bills’ defense in 2025!

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