Bills defensive coordinator emphasizing one message to team about loss to the Chiefs
Buffalo Bills defensive coordinator Leslie Frazier has won a Super Bowl as a player and an assistant coach, but he’s also been on coaching staffs that have lost in a league championship game.
Frazier said there is one constant whether you win or lose a big game: you can’t linger on the outcome.
The Bills’ 42-36 loss to the Chiefs in an AFC Divisional playoff game was a particularly tough one to take for the team and its fans. Buffalo led by three points with 13 seconds remaining in regulation, but kicked off into the end zone. The Chiefs moved into field-goal range after just two plays and forced overtime.
After the Chiefs won the coin toss and received the ball, they drove for a game-winning touchdown against Buffalo’s top-ranked defense.
Frazier and other Bills assistant coaches met with the media on Tuesday, and that loss was still a part of the questioning from reporters. That’s what led Frazier to discuss his experience with NFL highs and lows.
“One of the things that we talked about ... was just bringing them together at the end of the season and just let them be able to process the moment,” Frazier said. “But also explaining to them as well as our coaches how you have to be able to learn from the situation and move on. You have to be able to flush it and move on.
“If you don’t, it’ll carry over to the next season.”
The Bills will enter the 2022 season as a Super Bowl contender, but lingering doubts about that Chiefs loss potentially could derail the team’s hopes. That’s why Frazier has one message for the team: forget about what happened that night at Arrowhead Stadium.
“If we stay in the past with the last game of our season, it can have a negative effect on our 2022 season,” Frazier said. “So you got to learn from it, then you got to move on. You got to be locked in on what can help us to be the best in 2022. You got to approach it that way. And I think our guys are doing that. I think we’ve moved on from that and you gotta be looking forward in this league and just learn from wins and learn from losses as well.”
Kickoff miscommunication
Matthew Smiley met the media for the first time since being promoted from assistant special-teams coach to the coordinator’s job. He replaced Heath Farwell who left the Bills for a job with the Jaguars.
Smiley was asked about the Bills’ decision to kick deep rather than squib it and allow time to run off the clock.
“There are a lot of intricacies in the game of football, that it’s not as much as it is comforting to say, ‘it’s your fault. It’s his fault. This is exactly what happened.’” Smiley said.
“It’s the overall communication. Whether it’s 13 seconds to go in a playoff game or whether it is a Tuesday practice and what drill is going to go where, it’s improving communication that I think is very important.”
Smiley admitted there was a lack of execution on the kickoff that didn’t take any time off the clock.
“I would say we did not execute exactly the way we wanted to execute,” Smiley said. “So any time that’s the issue, there’s a lack of communication when there’s a lack of execution. I think they go hand in hand.”
