The Bills fired head coach Rex Ryan on Tuesday after 31 games on the job.
Ryan was hired on the back of his reputation as a defensive coach, but the unit never reached expectations over the last two years. Defensive tackle Marcell Dareus told Josina Anderson of ESPN that the loss of safety Aaron Williams hurt because communication was lacking “across the whole board for the defense.
Dareus also thinks the team “should’ve been just more aggressive on defense” and that Ryan’s scheme wasn’t a great fit for the players that the Bills had on hand.
“It was just too much detail for a lot of guys, and I feel like for a lot of guys it was too much going on for them to check here and check there, if this happens and that happens,” Dareus said. “Then nine times out of ten, a team will throw something out there that we weren’t prepared for, and then the adjustment to it, we had to get use to and try to make it happen and make plays.”
It’s not the first time that Bills players have sounded off about Ryan’s scheme and communication difficulties during games. Someone else will be responsible for making sure that doesn’t happen again in 2017.