1. Bouncing back from Week 4’s loss
The Bills had their first loss of the season in Week 4’s matchup against the Ravens. The coaching staff believes there’s lots to learn from the loss and they hope to use those lessons in Week 5.
“We need to make sure that we’re taking care of things week to week, game to game, and that we’re detailed the way we need to be detailed, we’re playing physical the way we need to play physical,” head coach Sean McDermott said.
McDermott admitted the Bills were challenged on both sides of the ball at the line of scrimmage. Quarterback Josh Allen said the Ravens were more physical at the line of scrimmage and believes they could have done a better job of communicating.
Offensive coordinator Joe Brady said it starts with him, and he’s taking full accountability for the offense’s struggles.
“You try to pride yourself on trying to be a two-dimensional football team and being able to run the ball and pass the ball,” Brady said. “…I got away from the run too early, and it puts a lot of stress on our guys.”
The Bills finished with just 81 rushing yards against the Ravens and were averaging 120 rushing yards per game going into the contest. Brady said he’s looking forward to getting back into the right rhythm during practices this week.
“It’s a great opportunity for us to get back to the basics and have a normal week of us getting after it, practicing the details, going through it all over again,” Brady shared. “I enjoy practice. I think when we’re flying around and the guys are knowing what we’re doing and we’re able to practice it, everything slows down on game day.”
After the Ravens rushed for 271 yards against Buffalo, defensive coordinator Bobby Babich said the defense needed to do a better job with their fundamentals. Babich said that starts with him.
“Failure is the best thing that can teach you,” Babich said. “I think success is an awful teacher…we just got to look at what happened. It has nothing to do with what we’re gonna do moving forward as long as we don’t let it. That was part of the message today was, ‘Hey, learn from our mistakes, move on, get better, and get ready for Houston.'”
Houston is 3-1 to start the season. Quarterback C.J. Stroud has the fourth-most passing yards in the league with 1,054 and ties for the fifth-most passing touchdowns with six.
They’re a team that’s loaded at wide receiver and bring the physicality on defense.
“They’ve been loading up for some time last year, and then this past offseason through the draft, through free agency,” McDermott said. “It seems like they already had a good team coming off last year’s team. So, it’s going to be a big challenge for us going into their place.”