Top five defensive schemers in the NFL right now

#4 Sean McDermott

With my next nomination I went with the guy whose defense has been one of the top five in the league for the last two year. Sean McDermott arrived in Buffalo in 2017 together with Brandon Beane, coming over from Carolina, and they have completely turned around that roster and the culture. They have parted ways with several highly paid veterans and brought in quality free agents, but mostly built through the draft.

That’s how this defense has come together as well. Their two starting corners were drafted and picked up as UDFAs, they selected their starting nickel, both inside linebackers, their starting 3-tech defensive tackle and a couple of rotational guys.

Unlike the other names I already talked about, the Bills don’t have a super versatile scheme with a bunch of fronts and personnel packages, but instead they are very good and making small adjustments according to their opponents.

They either have four D-linemen with their hand in the dirt or an outside backer in an over front, two linebackers with 83 and 100 percent of the snaps respectively and four defensive backs all being on the field for at least 94 percent of the plays.

What makes McDermott special as a defensive coach is not necessarily the way he can confuse offense, but instead how well everybody seems to know tendencies and their assignments.

They primarily run gameplan-specific zone coverages, where their defenders do a great dropping into areas to take away the staples of the opposing passing game and are highly effective at reading the receiver patterns.