The Buffalo Bills defensive coordinator is stepping down for the 2023 season. Frazier wants to recharge the batteries, take one season off, and return in 2024. Does Frazier need an Aaron Rodgers darkness retreat to figure out his football future? Frazier is 63 years old, has been with the Bills since 2017, and the team has had one of the best defenses in the league the last six regular seasons. Frazier, who serves the Bills as the defensive coordinator, was also the assistant head coach for the team. The General Manager of the Bills, Brandon Beane, is unsure if Frazier returns in 2024 that it might not be with the Bills organization. Frazier’s defense in regular season has swarmed their opponents like a plague of locusts. Frazier’s defense has manufactured takeaways from their opponents at a high rate. In the past two years in the post-season, the Bills defense has not been that domination machine like they are in regular season.

When Leslie Frazier took the job with the Buffalo Bills, I had sugar plums of that 1985 Bears defense dancing in my head. We all know Frazier was defensive back for the Chicago Bears and he was one of the starting corner backs on the best defense I ever have seen. That ’85 team that went on and won Superbowl XX. Frazier played 5 seasons in the NFL and was a sort of ball hawk by snaring 20 interceptions while having two defensive touchdowns. Frazier, after playing the game, has made a mark in the NFL coaching. Frazier started coaching by taking a head coaching job at a smaller college, Trinity International University, & he was there for 8 seasons. Then Frazier went to the Big Ten and took a job at the University of Illinois as a defensive back coach. Then Frazier found his first coaching job in the NFL as the Eagles defensive backs coach. After three seasons, Frazier would take on the defensive coordinator position for the Cincinnati Bengals. Frazier would move on to the Indianapolis Colts, moving up the ladder to being the defensive assistant in 2005. Then in 2006, he became the assistant head coach and took on the duties of being the defensive backs coach. Then Frazier would take his talents to Minnesota, staying there as the defensive coach, and moving up to assistant head coach while still coaching the defense. Eventually, Frazier would become the interim head coach when the Vikings fired Brad Childress. The interim tag was removed as he became the Vikings head coach and actually in 2012 led Minnesota to playoffs with a 10-6 record as they lost to the Green Bay Packers in the wild card game. Frazier went 21-32-1 as head coach in the NFL and 0-1 in the post-season. Frazier would then get fired, become the Buccaneers defensive coordinator for two seasons, & then moving on to Baltimore to become their secondary coach. Since 2017, Frazier has found a home in Buffalo working side by side with Sean McDermott.

It was too late in the game when Leslie Frazier decided to step away to get a top candidate to come in and take control over the Bills defense. The Bills will turn to their head coach, Sean McDermott, as he will call the defensive plays and still be the guy running the entire show on the sidelines. Could this be a good thing for the Bills with Frazier on sabbatical? They’ll have McDermott who was former defensive coordinator for the Panthers when Carolina made the Superbowl with the Fig Newton at quarterback. The Bills defense looked bad versus the Bengals as they could not get a lick of pressure on Joe Burrow as the Cincinnati quarterback just picked the Bills secondary apart.

The Bills were without their answer from the year before when they signed one of the best all-time pass rushers in the game, Von Miller, who was out for the season with a knee injury. The Bills were able to pressure Patrick Mahomes the year before the Bengals’ meltdown at home. Mahomes escaped the Bills pass rush like Houdini disappearing over and over. Then the Bills were not able to close out the Chiefs with 13 seconds remaining on the clock in that heartbreak loss that went to overtime. The Bills let Tyreek Hill just waltz down the field over and over especially helping the Chiefs get into field goal position during those 13 seconds to send that game into overtime.

The Bills did not get the ball as the Chiefs scored a touchdown and moved on to the AFC Championship game. Maybe the Bills need a new voice on that defense, a guy like McDermott who already gets players to play hard for him may be a good thing to help tweak that unit in the other direction. Frazier can relax knowing his guys are in good hands and enjoy being selected into the Black College Football Hall of Fame for his time at Alcorn State. The Bills defense was missing something as they did not have the eye of the tiger all year. It showed in that playoff game as the team needs something in the trenches; not to be manhandled by make-shift offensive line the Bengals brought to a snowy field in Buffalo. Hopefully the Bills will retain some of the guys who will be on the free agent market. Hope they add some pieces through free agency or by the draft to help this defense get where it should be. Maybe it’s time the old Bear from that ’85 team just hibernates and enjoys watching the game from his television set.