The Bills made some big changes to their defense this offseason by bringing in new players, but the biggest change on offense involved a player who was already on the team.
The Bills hired David Lee to be the quarterbacks coach and tasked him with working on Ryan Fitzpatrick’s mechanics. The goal is to cut down on the turnovers that plagued Fitzpatrick last season. While a better defense should allow the offense to take fewer dangerous chances, Fitzpatrick’s play down the stretch last season was inconsistent enough that you can’t blame all the problems on game situations.
Fitzpatrick is already starting to see the work on his footwork pay dividends. During a press conference on Tuesday, Fitzpatrick was asked if the mechanical tweaks are starting to become second nature.
“Yeah, it has. The other thing though is that it is just an answer maybe for some of my consistency issues,” Fitzpatrick said. “And so I will still fall into an old habit. ‘Well you threw the ball behind him because of this.’ And it is something we have worked on and talked about. And I think that is helpful.”
Lee’s work has been successful thus far, but the big test, as Fitzpatrick readily admits, will come when games start and defenses are coming after him full speed. If the changes aren’t second nature at that point, Fitzpatrick will likely start making the same old mistakes and the Bills offense will be dealing with the same old difficulties.