Bills Defensive Grades: Buffalo Bends, Doesn’t Break in OT Win Over Rams
The Buffalo Bills allowed 454 yards and 34 points and somehow still beat the Los Angeles Rams 37-34 in overtime.
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The defense did enough. Here are the Bills’ defensive game grades for Week 5.
Buffalo Bills Defensive Game Grades
Defensive line: B+
The Bills allowed only 77 rushing yards on 23 attempts, a 3.3-yard average, while playing without stalwart defensive lineman Ed Oliver.
Even though both Kyren Williams and Blake Corum scored touchdowns, each struggled to find holes against Buffalo’s stout front three. Plus, Oliver’s replacement, DeWayne Carter, logged the Bills’ only sack of Rams quarterback Matthew Stafford.
Outside linebackers: C
Greg Rousseau earned a game ball from head coach Joe Brady for blocking Harrison Mevis’ potential game-winning field goal in overtime.
But he and Bradley Chubb were largely absent all night. Chubb’s most notable contribution may have been taking a punch from Rams offensive lineman Alaric Jackson after the game.
Inside linebackers: C
Dorian Williams had nine tackles, and Terrel Bernard added seven tackles and a quarterback hit, but the Bills’ inside linebackers got burned on plays over their heads to tight end Tyler Higbee (5 receptions, 83 yards) all night.
Bernard tied with C.J. Gardner-Johnson for the second-most defensive snaps (78) on the team. Kaleb Elarms-Orr had a pass defended on LA’s final drive before halftime that kept the Rams from getting into field-goal range.
Cornerbacks: C
Davison Igbinosun had one pass defended for Buffalo, which came on a huge breakup in overtime on a pass for Rams wide receiver Puka Nacua. But Igbinosun also got burned the perfectly thrown fade route for Nacua’s 2-yard touchdown in the fourth.
The cornerbacks had to make more tackles than they should have, mainly since Nacua (17 receptions, 138 yards, 1 touchdown) and Davante Adams (5 receptions, 51 yards, 2 touchdowns) shredded the Buffalo secondary all night.
The duo of Adams and Nacua is the best one-two wide receiver punch in the league, so there’s no shame in getting gashed by them. But Christian Benford having 10 tackles on a night where Stafford threw for 383 yards and wasn’t intercepted tells you all you need to know.
Safeties: B-
The Bills forced only two punts, in part because they couldn’t cover Higbee or Nacua.
But Cole Bishop had 11 tackles, leading the Bills, while playing every defensive snap. Gardner-Johnson had seven tackles and returned from an injury to play 78 of Buffalo’s 82 defensive snaps.
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Damar Hamlin added five tackles on his 26 defensive snaps.
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This story was originally published October 13, 2026 at 12:45 PM.
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