Can the Bills Make a Run at the AFC East Title in 2015 Despite QB Concerns?

Yes, the Buffalo Bills are stuck in a division with the defending Super Bowl champion New England Patriots, and yes, the Pats have won 11 of the last 12 AFC East crowns. But it actually appears as though Buffalo—which is coming off just its second winning season this century—and its AFC East peers may be closing the gap on New England.

The Miami Dolphins may have made the biggest splash in free agency by signing All-Pro defensive tackle Ndamukong Suh to a monster contract, and the New York Jets also made headlines by bringing in Darrelle Revis, Antonio Cromartie and Ryan Fitzpatrick. But neither New York nor Miami finished with a winning record last season, and the Bills haven't exactly been shy either.

It starts, of course, with the five-year, $25 million contract they gave to extremely popular head coach and defensive mastermind Rex Ryan. But then the Bills signed controversial yet talented guard Richie Incognito, traded for Pro Bowl running back LeSean McCoy, re-signed a key front seven defender in Jerry Hughes and added potential starting quarterback Matt Cassel as well as a potent offensive weapon in Percy Harvin.

“I feel pretty good about what we’ve added," Ryan told Toronto's SportsNet 590 last week, per ESPN.com's Mike Rodak. "So we'll see. ... I think the conference really got stronger. If anything, it currently doesn’t look—if you can say winners and losers in free agency—obviously New England had to cut quite a few players.

"So obviously they don’t look as strong as they did. I certainly hope they’re not," he continued. "They just got through winning the Super Bowl. But I believe the rest of the division really has got stronger. I don’t think there’s any doubt about that. I truly believe that we got stronger.”

But did they get strong enough to slay the Goliathan Patriots?

No questioning the defense

Take the league's No. 4-ranked defense, add Ryan and you have a recipe for dominance. Ryan has spent the last 10 years as a defensive coordinator (four in Baltimore) or head coach (six in New York) and has led units that ranked in the top 10 in nine of those 10 seasons. The only season not included? That would be 2013, when the Jets ranked 11th.

The Jets did give up a lot of points the last couple of years and had fewer takeaways than anyone else in football in 2013 and 2014, but those units didn't really have a lot of talent beyond defensive linemen Sheldon Richardson and Muhammad Wilkerson.

Buffalo's front seven features four studs in Mario Williams, Kyle Williams, Marcell Dareus and Hughes. Kyle Williams and Dareus were two of only seven NFL defensive tackles who received grades above 20.0 from Pro Football Focus last season, while both Mario Williams and Hughes ranked in the top 15 at the defensive end position.

No wonder the Bills led the NFL with 54 sacks while being one of three defenses to record 30 or more takeaways last season.

	PPG	YPG	DVOA	Takeaways	Sacks
Total	18.1	312.2	-15.6	30	54
Rank	4th	4th	2nd	3rd	1st

They also have three solid cornerbacks in Leodis McKelvin, Corey Graham and Stephon Gilmore, which explains why they gave up a league-low 5.5 adjusted yards per pass attempt in 2014.

PFF ranked this D eighth in football, while Football Outsiders had it second behind only the Seattle Seahawks, and none of the aforementioned seven key cogs are older than 31. There's little doubt they'll do extensive damage again in 2015.

Right environment for Incognito and Harvin?

Both Incognito and Harvin come to town with off-field baggage.

The veteran guard hasn't played in a game since midway through the 2013 season and became somewhat of a pariah after his involvement in a bullying scandal that rocked the league that year.

The nine-year veteran was a Pro Bowler in 2012 and had a top-15 grade from PFF at the guard position before the Miami Dolphins suspended him in 2013. He's only 31 and could become a major upgrade as part of an interior offensive line that has been hit by a ton of injuries and turnover the last couple of seasons. But he's proved to be a locker room nuisance time and again, so it's hard to give him the benefit of the doubt.

Harvin is younger and supremely talented—a former first-round pick and All-Pro who won't turn 27 until May. But that's why it's concerning that the versatile speedster is joining his fourth team in a four-year period.

Harvin can be such a dangerous weapon as both a runner and a receiver that defenses are constantly having to keep an eye on him, which is what makes him a tremendous decoy in the right offense. This past season, he became a connoisseur of the jet sweep, which has him motioning across the field pre-snap in order to either take or pretend to take a handoff. And it often worked like a charm.

The problem is he's often been underutilized or straight-up misused. And as a result, he's failed to live up to some lucrative contracts.

On top of that, he's been far too fragile, missing three games last season due to ankle and rib injuries, virtually all of 2013 due to a hip injury and about half of 2012 as a result of an another ankle injury. He also has a long history with migraines.

As is the case with Incognito, the Bills also should be wary of Harvin's behavior. He's developed a reputation for causing trouble in locker rooms, with NFL.com's Lance Zierlein reporting that he got into it with teammate Golden Tate before the 2013 Super Bowl and nearly fought quarterback Russell Wilson in 2014.

He also refused to go back into a game in which the Seahawks lost to the Dallas Cowboys, according to Jayson Jenks and Bob Condotta of The Seattle Times:

"

“He’s just a time bomb,” one NFL source said, describing him as “too moody” and noting that Minnesota had also grown tired of dealing with Harvin, which precipitated his trade to Seattle in March 2013.

"

Ryan may feel he has the ability to control Harvin, whom he coached last November and December in New York. But it's not as though Ryan's been known for maintaining control of locker rooms in the past. This is a young team, and being young is synonymous with being impressionable. Do the Bills feel comfortable with the idea of veterans like Incognito and Harvin leaving impressions on the younger players on the roster?

Beyond that, can they get the most out of Incognito and Harvin on the field in order to justify the risk? It won't be easy, especially with the two making a combined $8.3 million on one-year prove-it deals, but that's just how desperate the Bills are on offense.

The good news is they'll have some support with McCoy as well as top 2014 draft pick Sammy Watkins at wide receiver and third-year left tackle Cordy Glenn coming off a stellar season.

Greg Roman's toys

Harvin has his limitations as a vertical threat, but within the right offense he has the ability to make a tremendous difference. And it's possible Buffalo will provide an ideal opportunity. That's because with McCoy on board and Watkins possessing All-Pro potential, he won't likely have to be anything close to a focal point within new offensive coordinator Greg Roman's system.

Total	2014	2015
1	C.J. Spiller	Percy Harvin
2		Richie Incognito
3		LeSean McCoy
4		Jerome Felton
5		Matt Cassel
Total	1	5

Despite a lack of support and poor play from his quarterbacks, Watkins had 65 catches, 982 yards and six touchdowns as a rookie. The 21-year-old was limited by an offense that lacked talent and saw only nine catchable deep balls thrown his way all season, but according to PFF he caught all nine of 'em.

And he dropped only five of 70 passes overall, which isn't shabby for a rookie. But he didn't have many complementary weapons and was working with quarterbacks who had a combined passer rating of just 86.0.

I have my concerns about McCoy, who may be declining after being worked heavily the last five years with the Philadelphia Eagles, but the man still ranked third in the league in rushing last season despite the fact his offensive line was ravaged by injuries and he wasn't getting much support from his quarterback or his receivers.

It's tough to know what to expect from Roman, who has been a puppet on Jim Harbaugh's strings during his four-year tenure as offensive coordinator for the San Francisco 49ers. But he's a former offensive line coach who comes from a run-first background, and Ryan has already been talking up a ground-and-pound approach.

So we can probably expect the Buffalo offense to run through McCoy and the rest of the backs while Roman—who can get creative with motion and blocking schemes—finds ways to involve Harvin as both a runner, a passer and a decoy. That should help free up Watkins to make plays, especially if he gets help from Robert Woods and whomever the Bills use at tight end.

Not done yet?

It's tough to successfully pull off ground-and-pound without a strong, versatile tight end. But a report from the Buffalo News' Vic Carucci on Monday indicated the Bills had a 90 percent chance of landing tight end Charles Clay, who is currently carrying the transition tag from the Miami Dolphins.

Tight end	Drop rate
Jermaine Gresham	1.59
Antonio Gates	2.82
Jason Witten	3.03
Brent Celek	3.03
Charles Clay	3.33

Buffalo still has over $14 million in salary-cap space, according to Over the Cap, and Clay is yet another versatile weapon who would contribute inside with stellar pass-catching and strong blocking. Combine his presence with that of former Pro Bowl fullback Jerome Felton, whom the Bills signed away from the Minnesota Vikings last week, and you'd have one of the hardest-nosed offenses in the league.

It could hardly run last year. PFF graded the line as the worst run-blocking unit in the league, and Football Outsiders ranked it 26th in terms of adjusted line yards. But add McCoy, Incognito, Felton, Harvin and Clay, as well as Roman, who always got plenty out of Frank Gore and Co. in San Francisco, and you have a chance to completely turn it around on the ground.

That could take a ton of pressure off of an offense that still lacks a proven quarterback and might not have a solution to that problem this offseason.

Out of the first round

I think what this all amounts to is the Bills offense should at least be respectable in 2015.

Sure, the Bills are taking chances on Harvin, Incognito and even McCoy, they're far from set at quarterback and they have to hope that Roman can adjust to a unit with a very different set of featured skills than the one he had in San Francisco, but we're looking at a nice amount of talent regardless. And the defense should make it so that the Bills rarely have to run up the scoreboard in order to win.

Unfortunately, though, they won't have any perceived blue-chip rookies improving the roster this spring. That's because the Bills traded away their 2015 first-round pick in order to move up to draft Watkins last May, making them and the Seattle Seahawks the only teams without first-round selections.

That's a shame because the Bills might have been able to add another solid, NFL-ready piece with that No. 19 overall pick. Instead, they're not slated to be on the clock until the 50th overall selection, which isn't ideal for a team that is still trying to play catch-up.

Still missing the most important piece

Right now, the only true major difference between the Patriots and Bills is that New England has future Hall of Fame quarterback Tom Brady, while Buffalo is stuck having to decide between Cassel and EJ Manuel.

Two years into his career, Manuel has completed just 58.6 percent of his passes and has a passer rating of just 78.5. It might be too early to call the 2013 first-round pick a bust, but it surprised nobody when Ryan called the quarterback situation "unresolved" in a January press conference.

That's why Buffalo brought in Cassel, who excelled in place of the injured Brady in New England in 2008 and showed glimpses during the 2010 season with the Kansas City Chiefs but has spent the last two years riding the bench for the Minnesota Vikings.

Dating back to 2011, Cassel has been the league's fourth-lowest-rated passer among the 43 quarterbacks with at least 500 attempts during that span. And now, he's on the brink of his 33rd birthday. There isn't a lot of hope there, but at least there'll be some competition between an experienced dude like him, a talented dude like Manuel,and wild card Tyrod Taylor.

This whole situation probably scares the Bills because you just don't win big in this league without a strong quarterback. The only Super Bowl-winning quarterbacks not named Brady, Manning, Brees, Roethlisberger or Rodgers who have won Super Bowls in the last 12 years are Joe Flacco and Russell Wilson, who had a combined touchdown-to-interception ratio of 14-0 during their respective Super Bowl runs.

But the Arizona Cardinals made the playoffs in 2014 despite a ton of problems at quarterback, and the Carolina Panthers have done the same the last two years despite inconsistent play under center. Further reading: the Houston Texans or Minnesota Vikings in 2012.

And Ryan has had some success despite lacking a stud quarterback. He and the Jets got to the AFC championship in both 2009 and 2010, falling just short of a Super Bowl appearance in the latter year. All that despite the fact their starting quarterback, Mark Sanchez, was the league's lowest-rated passer among pivots who started at least 17 games during that two-year span.

Quarterback	Rating	Team wins (incl. playoffs)
Mark Sanchez	70.2	24
Matt Hasselbeck	74.2	14
Chad Henne	75.3	14
Ryan Fitzpatrick	77.7	10
Jay Cutler	80.9	19
Matt Cassel	80.9	14
Alex Smith	81.8	14
Josh Freeman	82.2	13

Can Ryan recapture that magic?

Pats take a step backward

The Bills finished three games back of the Patriots last season, but they don't single-handedly have to make up that difference. It might help that cap-strapped New England has lost four key players—cornerback Darrelle Revis, defensive tackle Vince Wilfork (who announced Monday he's joining the Texans) running back Shane Vereen and corner Brandon Browner—on the open market.

Look, the Patriots might be the reigning champs, but that hasn't meant much in recent years. It's been a decade since we've had a repeat champion, and only one of the last nine defending champs has won a playoff game (four didn't even make the postseason).

The sky was falling in New England in late September. Brady, who will be 38 this summer, has clearly been forced to change his game and is no longer putting up the numbers he did a few years ago.

New England is, at the very least, mortal.

Hype is dangerous

But the Patriots have never been about hype, which is often poisonous in this league. Ryan and his bravado did more harm than good to the Jets, the Dolphins' pursuit of big-name free agents hasn't done much to help them on the field and splashy moves haven't exactly paid off for the Bills in the past.

Guys like Ryan, Harvin and Incognito have become more famous for what they've said and/or done off the field than what they've accomplished on it, the jury's still out on Roman outside of San Francisco and McCoy's a big name who didn't deliver in a lot of key areas last season.

The Bills are taking a lot of chances here, and it'll inevitably help with ticket sales as they build hype around a team that suddenly possesses a lot of familiar names and faces. But will that be enough to get them back to the top of the AFC East for the first time in 16 years? A lot of stars still must align.

Brad Gagnon has covered the NFL for Bleacher Report since 2012.

Follow @Brad_Gagnon