Four-CB defenses work--but watch the run. (The war room: what we saw on film this week).

It seemed like every time we watched film of the Bills' defense earlier this year, it was giving up big plays to right ends. In the Bills' first nine games, they gave up six touchdowns to tight ends, who caught a lot of passes against the Bills on seam routes between the linebacker and safety. For most of the season, the Bills have tried using a combination of outside linebacker Eddie Robinson and strong safety Coy Wire to cover tight ends. Robinson would try to jam tight ends at the line and would be responsible for covering them in the short-to-intermediate zone. But if a tight end broke vertically, it was Wire's job to pick him up.

Although this basically meant double coverage, the problem for the Bills was that tight ends were finding too many holes between the zones. And it became increasingly difficult to use Robinson on the press because opponents were motioning their tight end away from Robinson or splitting the tight end out in order to get Robinson outside of the box. So when we heard that the Bills held Chiefs Pro Bowler Tony Gonzalez, the league's most dangerous and consistent pass-catching tight end, to just 17 yards on two ...