With a new defensive scheme, will the Dolphins have a better answer for Bills QB Josh Allen?
If not for a historic start to the season for the Dolphins’ offense, Miami’s defense might be preparing this week for the hottest unit in the NFL.
After a season-opening dud in a loss to the New York Jets, the Buffalo Bills have looked more like the team many projected to be one of the best in the AFC. And the offense has been on a tear, scoring a combined 75 points in the past two games, both wins. Buffalo is averaging 30.3 points per game, which ranks second only to the Dolphins.
Personnel and schemes change from year to year, but in Miami’s troubles against the Bills, quarterback Josh Allen has been a constant. However, in the Dolphins’ first matchup of the season with Buffalo in Orchard Park, New York, on Sunday, Miami will be operating a new defensive scheme than Allen is accustomed to seeing in their meetings.
“He’s a handful to play against,” defensive coordinator Vic Fangio said Thursday. “I don’t think there’s any one way to play. That’s kind of the definition of a great quarterback. There is no one way to play him or everybody would do it. And he’s tough to handle. You always got to defend two plays: the play they call in the huddle and the play he can create on the run. They utilize the [run-pass option] game too, which he’s good at. So he’s a tough assignment.”
The stats back up Fangio’s comments.
Since Allen entered the league as the No. 7 overall pick in the 2018 Draft, he has mainly seen a Miami defense based around high rates of blitzing and coverages with one or no deep safeties. But he has performed well against the Dolphins, no matter what defensive scheme they’ve used.
According to TruMedia, which has tracked the data to 2019, Allen has a 109.3 passer rating against the Dolphins when facing coverages with one or no deep safeties — Cover 1, Cover 3 and Cover 0. Allen has completed 63.4 percent of his passes for 17 touchdowns and one interception against those coverages, averaging 7.6 yards per attempt.
When facing two-high-safety coverages, of which the Dolphins have increased their usage under Fangio, Allen has still been effective but not as dangerous. Allen has a passer rating of 91.7 when throwing into Cover 2, Cover 4 and Cover 6; he’s completed 70.9 percent of his passes for one touchdown and one interception, averaging 7.7 yards per attempt.
According to TruMedia, the Dolphins’ most-often-used coverage is Cover 3 — a zone concept with one deep safety — which has come on 38.8 percent of opposing dropbacks. That figure is similar to last season’s mark (37.2 percent), but Miami’s second-most used coverage is Cover 6 — a zone concept that combines Cover 4 and Cover 2 — increasing from 0.8 percent last season to 26.4 percent this season.
In three games this season, Allen has completed 72.7 percent of his passes for 728 yards, five touchdowns and four interceptions. Three of those picks came in the Week 1 loss to the Jets. Allen has also run the ball 12 times for 89 yards and one touchdown but has fumbled twice.
Though Fangio hasn’t blitzed nearly as frequently as predecessors Brian Flores and Josh Boyer — Miami’s 24 percent blitz rate ranks 19th in the NFL — he has called on extra rushers in key moments, particularly at the end of the team’s Week 1 win against the Los Angeles Chargers.
Two weeks ago, Fangio said the lower rate of blitzing “somewhat has a surprise element. They don’t get overprotection conscious with the protections and keeping extra blockers in.”
The last time the Dolphins faced Allen, which came in the season-ending loss in the wild-card round, they once again saw the limits of an approach too rooted in either extreme. The team was beaten on several blitzes early before scoring a touchdown on a well-timed blitz at the beginning of the second half. But as the game progressed, Miami dialed back the extra rushers, sitting in many of the zone coverages that have been a staple of the 2023 unit. Allen settled in and adjusted well, though, as the Bills squeaked out a 34-31 win.
“You can throw anything you want at him but the dude is going to get his plays,” linebacker Jerome Baker said Thursday. “But the best thing is to contain him in the pocket, don’t let him get out of the pocket. With our defense, it’s going to take the whole team. It doesn’t really matter what scheme you put up against him. If you don’t play together, none of that will work. I think this scheme, it has potential to be good against him, but it doesn’t matter if we don’t execute, really lock in and play together.
Baker and Fangio also see an offense that is beginning to evolve, using more two-tight-end sets and running the ball with its backs efficiently and not just Allen. Buffalo ranks seventh in rushing yards to go with their typically dynamic passing offense, which ranks 12th.
But Allen remains the focal point of it all.
“He’s one of the few quarterbacks that can put a team on his back and carry it with his arm and his legs,” Fangio said. “He’s a tough guy to stop.”
This story was originally published September 28, 2023 at 4:31 PM.
