5 player-vs-player matchups that will decide New York Jets-Buffalo Bills

These 5 particular head-to-head battles will be especially crucial in deciding the outcome of Sunday's divisional clash between the New York Jets and Buffalo Bills. Jets RB Le'Veon Bell vs. Bills LB Matt Milano With an alarming lack of depth at wide receiver - there are only four healthy wideouts on the active roster as of Saturday morning - the Jets could be distributing their targets in the mold of a late-2010s Patriots team, running the offense through a slot receiver, the tight ends, and the lead back. New England did this with Julian Edelman, Rob Gronkowski (plus Martellus Bennett in 2016), and James White. Here in 2020, the Jets could take a similar approach with Jamison Crowder, Chris Herndon, Ryan Griffin, and Le'Veon Bell. Bell saw plenty of targets last season, ranking seventh among running backs with 78 throws in his direction (5.2 per game), but he will likely have even more on his plate tomorrow afternoon. Sam Darnold tossed nine passes to Bell in last year's season opener against Buffalo. Look for a similar total this week, perhaps even a bit higher. Bell's career-high in targets is 14, and he has had 12 games in his career with double-digit targets. In the last season-opening battle between the Jets and Bills, Bell broke the game open with a nine-yard touchdown grab against Bills linebacker Matt Milano. Bell, lined up in a stack behind Robby Anderson, does a nice job of stemming his route to keep Milano inside and then cuts outside sharply to create separation. He bails out Darnold will a phenomenal grab inches above the ground. The Bills may have blown that coverage. It appears the outside corner should have passed off Anderson's corner route to the safety and stayed in the flat to cover the first out-breaking route (which Bell ran), while Milano was to cover the first in-breaking route. Nevertheless, Bell ran a solid route and then made an even better catch for the six. He will likely be lining out wide plenty on Sunday (putting pressure on Frank Gore to handle pass protection in the backfield), so the Jets will need a bunch of strong reps against the Buffalo linebackers like that one. Milano is actually a very solid cover linebacker. In 2019, he was tagged with allowing only 5.1 yards per target, second-best among qualified linebackers behind only former Jets draft pick Demario Davis. In addition, that touchdown by Bell was the only one that Milano was credited with giving up all season. On this play against the Jets in Week 10 of 2018 (I forgive you if you forget this game ever happened), Buffalo trusts Milano to line up out wide and play the deep-third zone opposite running back Trenton Cannon. Josh McCown throws up a hot air balloon and Milano picks it off. It's not the most groundbreaking play, as McCown's throw is awful and Cannon doesn't even play the ball, but the fact Buffalo even put Milano in that position shows what they think of his coverage ability. That ugly throw was caused by Kelvin Beachum's terrible protection rep against Jerry Hughes, who we will focus on in a moment. The Bell-vs.-Milano clash features an all-time great receiving back against one of the league's most productive cover linebackers, with Bell likely to be featured even more than usual due to a dearth of reliability at wide receiver. This matchup is going to be massively important. Jets LT Mekhi Becton vs. Bills EDGE Jerry Hughes The Big Ticket's debut should feature plenty of battles against veteran Bills defensive end Jerry Hughes. The 32-year-old was Buffalo's primary rusher from the defense's right side in 2019, leading the team with 382 rushes from that side (23.9 per game). In each of the last three seasons, Hughes lined up on the right side for over 94% of his pass-rush snaps. Hughes is not the beast he once was, but he had a respectable season in 2019. Picture a hunter green Reebok Mark Sanchez jersey you bought in the summer of 2009. It doesn't have nearly the same flair that it once did, but it's still passable enough to wear around the town. That's Hughes. He picked up 43 pressures on 405 rushes for a pressure rate of 11.9%, good enough for the 54th percentile among qualifiers and slightly above the positional average of 11.3%. Fantastic analogy, I know. Make no mistake about it, though. Hughes will give Becton a tough challenge to kick off his career. While the veteran may not have a ton of athletic juice left, he still has a wide array of moves in his arsenal. Becton's film study and situational awareness will be tested - over the course of a game, can he feel out the situation and read his opponent's tendencies well enough to anticipate what move is most likely to be coming on each play? Even with his gifted blend of athleticism and power, it is going to take strong pre-game preparation, proper technique, sound fundamentals, and savvy in-game adjustments for Becton to consistently win reps like the one seen below. Miami left tackle J'Marcus Webb takes an aggressive set against Hughes (wide 5-tech) on this play action pass. Hughes sells outside, plants his right foot, clubs with his left arm, and swims over top. Ryan Fitzpatrick is forced to immediately release the ball for an incompletion, and Webb tackles Hughes to prevent the sack, warranting a holding penalty. Webb expected an outside move with Hughes lined up so far out wide, so Hughes' plan to sell outside and rush inside was perfect to beat that pass set. Lineman-vs.-rusher battles are often like a game of rock-paper-scissors. Things happen so quickly post-snap that many victories are taken before the ball is even snapped. If one player decides he's going with rock and the other decides he's going with scissors, the battle may be over before it begins. Being able to accurately predict your opponent's actions is so, so crucial. It's the whole point of studying film. There's also plenty of learning on the fly that goes on during the course of a game. Perhaps #58 showed on film that he always goes to the swim move when he lines up in a three-point stance on third down, but when you get out there, you notice he has altered his approach and is instead using a bull-rush in those situations. Being able to pick these things up and adjust in-game is equally important to pre-game preparation. Becton will have an athletic edge over Hughes, but if the rookie is not on his game technically and mentally, Hughes will cause some havoc. Here's what's interesting about Hughes (squashing my amazing analogy) - he was actually dominant in 2018, just one season prior to his so-so 2019 campaign. That year, he tied for second among edge defenders in pressures (74) on the 37th-most pass-rush snaps (375), leading the position with a 19.7% pressure rate. In the 2018 Milano interception clip shown in the first section, Hughes' obliteration of Kelvin Beachum is what forced McCown's ugly throw. It seems unlikely Hughes comes close to those peaks again, but the fact he was elite so recently is a reminder of how gifted he is. For Becton's future, it's great that his career will begin with the competition bar set high, no matter the results. However, for the present-day Jets, it is essential that Becton wins this matchup against Hughes in the passing game if Darnold is going to have any chance of producing. Jets LBs Neville Hewitt and Blake Cashman vs. Bills TEs Dawson Knox, Lee Smith, and Tyler Kroft Buffalo has a three-man stable of tight ends that are each capable of destroying linebackers in the blocking game. I had the Bills' tight end group ranked as the league's third-best at blocking in 2019. A huge part of the Jets' collapse in Week 1 of last season was the number of big rushing plays they began to allow once C.J. Mosley hit the bench. One man in particular was the driving force behind many of those runs - Lee Smith. Smith gets out to the second level and manhandles Neville Hewitt to create a 23-yard run for Devin Singletary. Smith explodes into the block with good pad level, plants, and uses torque in his hips to manuever Hewitt to the inside and prevent him from filling his gap. Smith embarrassed Hewitt again later in the drive. As the in-line/inside tight end to the right, Smith blocks down and pins Hewitt inside. On the edge, Tyler Kroft pins Harvey Langi inside. Those two blocks get the party started, making the pull blocks for the center and right guard all too easy. Singletary gets 15 yards to set up Buffalo near the goal line. Great stop by Marcus Maye, by the way. On the very next play, Smith set up a scrambling touchdown for Allen as he neutralizes Henry Anderson in space to give Allen enough room to hit the edge. While you were directing your anger at Josh Allen, Kaare Vedvik, Darryl Roberts, Trumaine Johnson, or Adam Gase, the man most responsible for causing the Bills' comeback might actually have been this guy. Tight. End. Blocking. Matters. And WR/RB/FB blocking, too. Although it was Smith taking the spotlight against the Jets, Knox and Kroft are also strong blockers. The Jets need their linebackers to win their gaps in the run game against Buffalo's tight ends if they are going to stop the run effectively enough to force Josh Allen into a lot of 3rd & long scenarios. Jets TE Chris Herndon vs. Bills LB Tremaine Edmunds Edmunds is an extremely athletic and talented young linebacker, but he is very susceptible to blown coverages, often getting locked onto the quarterback and losing track of his responsibility. He ranked at the 13th percentile among qualified linebackers with 9.1 yards per target allowed in coverage during the 2019 regular season. On a play action naked bootleg by Dallas, Edmunds disregards Jason Witten and vacates his area to pursue Dak Prescott. Witten releases late and runs into Edmunds' original zone uncovered for a touchdown. The Patriots run a fake end-around on this play and it freezes Edmunds in place, leaving Rex Burkhead wide open for a 31-yard gain. Run play action and get some traffic going in Edmunds' area, and you should be able to count on him to leave someone open a couple of times per game. Poised for a bevy of targets with the wide receiver group in flux, Chris Herndon could be positioned to take advantage of Edmunds in coverage. This play against the Packers in Week 16 of 2018 showcases Herndon's versatility and exemplifies how it can be used to exploit Edmunds. Herndon motions across the formation pre-snap to shift the defense left, including middle linebacker Blake Martinez. Post-snap, the Jets fake an outside zone to the left while Herndon runs a drag across the field to the right side. The motion holds Martinez's attention long enough for Herndon to get the space for a 13-yard first down pickup. With a revamped and depleted offense against an elite defense that has almost every player returning, Adam Gase's creativity will be under the microscope. Herndon's skill-set is perfectly built to be featured in unconventional concepts. Look for Gase to emphasize finding ways to free up the young tight end that he only got to use for a handful of snaps last year. Jets S Marcus Maye vs. Bills QB Josh Allen Maye had Allen's number when these two teams clashed one year ago, breaking into perfect position for two interception opportunities. He picked off one Allen pass, but it was called back by a Darryl Roberts penalty that did not affect the play, and he would later drop a second interception opportunity. Additionally, Maye was fantastically consistent at executing his responsibilities in coverage. Maye was tagged with no receptions allowed, and Allen did not complete any passes in the deep middle. He attempted only one, which was broken up by C.J. Mosley. Even though Maye could not come out of the game with an official interception, you know a free safety has the offense figured out any time he can put himself in position for two picks while not allowing anything to be completed in his area. Maye is the single-high safety and shades to the field side pre-snap to mirror the motioning tight end. John Brown runs a deep post from Maye's side, and Maye picks it up. Allen takes the shot but leaves it much too far inside, and Maye undercuts for the interception. He gets a nice return, too, scampering for 23 yards. It remains to be seen how Gregg Williams will alter his utilization of Maye now that Jamal Adams is in Seattle. Regardless of where he lines up, the Jets will need more of the same fundamentally-sound deep coverage that Maye provided last year if they are going to hold Stefon Diggs and John Brown in check. Maye might have the best chance of any Jets defender to record an interception due to the understanding of the Buffalo offense that he showed last year, but any takeaways would be gravy. The most important goal is to avoid blown coverages and communicate effectively enough to prevent Allen from connecting with Diggs and Brown down the field. The Diggs/Brown duo against the Jets' secondary is Buffalo's biggest offensive advantage. If the Jets can somehow win or neutralize that battle, Buffalo would be forced to play into their own weaknesses and the Jets' strengths, putting the Jets in fantastic shape defensively. With the deep game shut down, the Bills will be forced to rely on the run game against a great run-stopping Jets front, Cole Beasley will be tossed into the limelight against Brian Poole's elite slot coverage, and Allen will likely become an overly conservative checkdown artist against a secondary that tackles very well. That's a best-case scenario way of looking at things, but regardless of how the domino effect plays out, the Jets need Maye's outside-the-broadcast-view deep coverage to be at its best. Barring a takeaway, the less you hear Maye's name or see him on the TV screen, the better.