Weather will no longer be a factor, but Bills still wary of Browns RB Nick Chubb

UPDATE:NFL moves Bills vs Browns game to Detroit as Buffalo snowstorm hits

ORCHARD PARK - Even though the Buffalo Bills game against the Browns Sunday has been moved to Detroit’s Ford Field, that doesn’t mean that Cleveland’s star running back, Nick Chubb, will be any easier to stop.

One of the big storylines for the week - now made irrelevant - was how much the nasty weather could impact the showdown between the Lake Erie rivals if it remained outdoors at snowy, windy Highmark Stadium.

Countless Bills fans continue to buy into the tired and erroneous narrative that bad weather is a good thing for the Bills because they believe the Bills somehow have an advantage in wintry conditions. It simply isn’t true, especially this week when the opponent is the Browns, a team well-versed in the perils of playing in snow, wind and cold.

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The Bills are miles and miles better at passing the ball than the Browns, and their aerial game led by Josh Allen and Stefon Diggs is the crux of their offense. Had the game stayed in Orchard Park, the reality is that in all likelihood, Allen would not have had the full breadth of the Buffalo passing offense at his disposal. You simply can’t play the same way in wintry conditions as you can on a sunny September day, or, in a dome.

The Browns, on the other hand, are built to succeed in bad weather because unlike the Bills, they don’t need to light up the skies with dynamic passes to move the ball. They can pound the ball on the ground with Chubb, one of the best players in the NFL.

Chubb’s 904 rushing yards are third-most in the league, his 11 rushing TDs are No. 1, and he’s averaging 5.7 yards per attempt which is fifth among all running backs.

The Browns would have been perfectly comfortable in the cold and wind and snow taking the ball out of inconsistent quarterback Jacoby Brissett’s hands and putting it in Chubb’s belly.

Of course, they’ll still do that even with the venue change, but now, the Bills’ offense will be allowed to function at full capacity and if Allen and company have a good game and they get out to a lead, that will likely lessen Chubb’s role. That’s not to say, however, that the Bills aren’t still concerned about the fifth-year back who already has 5,720 yards rushing in just 67 career games.

“We’ve just got to do a good job of not giving up the explosive (plays),” defensive coordinator Leslie Frazier said. “That explosive run that Dalvin (Cook) had really put a damper on some of the good things we were doing against the run (against the Vikings).

“And Chubb is another type of back who you can stop, and stop, and stop and all of the sudden he can break one. So we have to learn from (Sunday’s) ball game and just stay gap sound and tackle throughout because he is an exceptional running back and one of the best, if not the best, in the National Football League.”

This season, the Bills got off to a great start defending the run as only one team - Lamar Jackson and the Ravens - surpassed more than 80 yards. Baltimore had 162 that day with Jackson rushing for 73. Since then, the run defense has sagged badly.

In two games where they knew the opposition was going to rely on the run, the Packers lit up the Bills for 208 yards and the Jets rushed for 174 including nearly 80 on the game-winning drive. And then Sunday, they were doing a good job on Cook until he broke his 81-yard TD and by the end, the Vikings had 147 ground yards.

The Bills sat No. 1 in the NFL in run defense through Week 7 at 76.2 yards per game. Since then, they have dropped to seventh with a yield of 109.2 yards. Meanwhile, the Browns come to town ranked fifth in the NFL in rushing at 158.8 yards per game.

“Turn the tape on and you're impressed,” coach Sean McDermott saif of Chubb. “You watch people get population to the ball and then all of a sudden he comes out of it and it's an explosive run for another 20-30 yards. He's as good as there is in the league.

McDermott said the key to good run defense is to be consistent and avoid the breakdowns that lead to plays such as Cook’s 81-yard TD where several things went wrong in terms of holding the edge and the angles that were taken on the play.

“Having that consistency down in and down out of being in our gap, and then the fits behind the gap integrity up front,” he said. “You watch the game this past week … we were handling it pretty well. The guys were battling and they were playing physical and then one run all of a sudden goes for 70-80 yards and it skews kind of the effort overall, but you can't let it happen. You watch Chubb and they're stopping, they're stopping and all of a sudden bang, one run pops and you’ve got a problem on your hands.”

Sal Maiorana can be reached at maiorana@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter @salmaiorana.To subscribe to Sal's new twice-a-week newsletter, Bills Blast, please follow this link: https://profile.democratandchronicle.com/newsletters/bills-blast

This article originally appeared on Rochester Democrat and Chronicle: Nick Chubb big test for Buffalo Bills run defense