George Edwards New Defensive Coordinator for Buffalo Bills

George Edwards, former linebackers coach for the Miami Dolphins, has been hired as the defensive coordinator of the Buffalo Bills. He will be engineering a switch to the 3-4 base alignment.

With the announcement out of the way, I must say I am not pleased with this hire. He does have some experience as defensive coordinator for a year with the Cleveland Browns. In that year, the Browns defense ranked 15th in yards per game and 12th in points allowed per game.

That is his only experience running a defense. I would have personally preferred promoting defensive line coach Bob Sanders to full time defensive coordinator. He has experience as a defensive coordinator with the Green Bay Packers and he knows the roster.

Plus, there is the matter of the scheme switch. With all the troubles on offense, I think it would have made sense to keep the base alignment and spend more time and effort on improving the offense.

Instead, the Bills have now made an emphasis on overhauling basically the entire roster. The Bills will need to get a true nose tackle (actually two, one to start and one for depth), a couple of 3-4 defensive ends (Spencer Johnson should have no trouble transitioning since he’s played both DE and DT), and bigger inside linebackers.

That’s a lot of change on the defense in one off-season. Plus, the Bills need to figure out who the quarterback is and they need offensive tackle help, especially at left tackle. There’s a lot to be done. It’s ambitious, but I think it’s too ambitious. I’ve made it known I would prefer to stay with the 4-3.

However, what’s done is done. We’ll just have to see what happens.