With Bills coach Sean McDermott rounding out his staff in the next few weeks, a focus on his coordinators is a natural point of interest for fans. We here are Buffalo Wins love the people, so I chatted with Christopher Gates of the Daily Norseman, a fine blog in the SBNation family about defensive coordinator Leslie Frazier. Hopefully this will give a local blogger’s opinion on his time with the Vikings – both as coordinator and as head coach.
Let’s talk his time as defensive coordinator first. What was your overall opinion of his scheme?
During his time in Minnesota (2007 to 2010), Frazier was a proponent of the “Tampa-2” defense that saw the Vikings play a lot of zone and not really blitz a whole lot. Frazier’s scheme in Minnesota was predicated on the team getting pressure primarily from the front four on defense and dropping a lot of guys into coverage.
With the players he had at the time, there were plenty of times that scheme was successful. . .however, if the pressure doesn’t get to the quarterback, it leaves a lot of things open.
During most of Frazier’s tenure as defensive coordinator, the team had a pretty outstanding pass rush. The Vikings made a deal with the Kansas City Chiefs to acquire Jared Allen, and he immediately made the Vikings’ pass rush a force. He also had the “Williams Wall” (Kevin Williams and Pat Williams) in the middle of the defense, and they played a big role in the Vikings leading the NFL in rushing defense in two of Frazier’s first three seasons as the DC.
Ray Edwards, the other defensive end, benefitted from the presence of those other three players greatly, and parlayed the production he had because of the attention paid to those other three players into a big free agent deal with the Atlanta Falcons. . .after which he pretty much fell off the face of the earth. There were some standout players at other positions as well, notably linebacker Chad Greenway and cornerback (and former Bill) Antoine Winfield, but the calling card during the Frazier era was definitely the defensive line.
How important have the safeties been, considering the Bills are horrible there at present?
In a defense like the Tampa-2, the safeties play a pretty big part, since they’re supposed to cover deeper parts of the field and be the last line of defense. In his first couple of seasons, Darren Sharper did a pretty good job at one safety spot, but the players that the Vikings had next to him were less than spectacular.
Sharper moved on before the 2009 season, and the Vikings really struggled at the safety spot until Harrison Smith was drafted in 2012, so the safety spot wasn’t exactly a strength during Frazier’s tenure with Minnesota. This is why the pass defense had a tendency to struggle a bit despite having the talent up front to get to the quarterback.
In his time as coordinator, what was the general impression of Frazier?
Frazier gained a reputation as a very good defensive coach, and had interviews with several teams before becoming the Vikings’ interim head coach in 2010. He held on to a scheme that was becoming increasingly outdated, and you have to think that the talent on the Vikings’ pass rush masked a lot of the deficiencies that the defense had.
After all, Frazier had a future Hall of Famer in Jared Allen, a borderline HoF candidate in Kevin Williams, and one of the best run-stoppers of his generation in Pat Williams. He knew what the strength of the defense was, and he played to it pretty well.
After he became head coach, what differences, if any did you notice?
Frazier had a couple of rough years after getting the job as head coach, but that had as much to do with the talent dropping off than anything else. The Vikings were an aging team, and in 2011 pretty much decided to blow everything up and rebuild. They were bad pretty much everywhere. . .the defense was terrible, the offense wound up going to a rookie quarterback after Donovan McNabb ended up being a disaster, and they blew a lot of leads that first season.
They were significantly better in 2012, largely because of the monster season that Adrian Peterson had. The Vikings still didn’t look great for the better part of that season, but Peterson basically willed that team into the playoffs. Then, when Peterson couldn’t replicate his performance, the Vikings wound up falling off in a big way in 2013, after which Frazier was fired. The younger players seemed to take a liking to him, which was a positive.
Overall, how would you view his tenure as a Vikings coach?
Given that he finished his head coaching tenure with a record of 21-32-1, it’s pretty hard to classify it as successful. Again, that first season wasn’t really his fault. . .I’m not sure if anyone would have been successful given the circumstances that season. But ultimately, he just didn’t have a great run the first time around.
That’s not to say that he couldn’t be a successful head coach in the future, but he didn’t get it done in Minnesota the first time.
Is there anything that sticks out as a definitive “Frazier” moment as a Viking?
From all accounts, he’s just about the nicest person in the National Football League. I’m not sure how well that translates into being a head coach, but that’s the reputation he has around the league. His press conferences have been known to cure insomnia, which is going to be quite a shift for Bills fans after a couple of years of Rex Ryan.
You’ll have to familiarize yourself with the phrase “We’re going to take a look at the tape and make some changes,” because that seems to be how he prefaces his answers to a lot of questions. Ultimately, however, I hope he’s successful in Buffalo.
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