ORCHARD PARK – Little did Buffalo Bills defensive lineman TJ Sanders know how beneficial playing an unfamiliar position for part of his rookie season would be heading into the new world that is the 2026 defense.
Sanders was primarily a defensive tackle during his three seasons at South Carolina, and that’s what the Bills intended for him to be in Sean McDermott’s even-man front when they picked him in the second round of the 2025 draft.
Sanders was still trying to find his way in the NFL and having rather minimal impact through the first four games when he suffered a knee injury that required surgery and knocked him out for the next five games.
Further complicating his rookie season, when he was ready to return the Bills were in the midst of an injury crisis on the edge with Michael Hoecht and Landon Jackson on injured reserve and Javon Solomon not being a player they trusted, so McDermott asked Sanders to slide outside to play the bulk of his snaps in the next four games.
“We needed to find a player who could do both, in terms of getting us out of a jam,” McDermott said following the Week 11 victory over Tampa Bay when Sanders made his debut on the edge. “TJ ended up taking some normal reps there. I thought our D-line coaches did a good job getting him ready. Credit to him, too, he came in and was like, ‘Hey, whatever you want me to do, I’ll do.’ That doesn’t happen a lot, especially for a player who is so young.”
Not surprisingly, though, while he was a dutiful soldier, Sanders didn’t give the Bills much production while learning a new position on the fly in his inaugural NFL season. He spent much of the season with his head spinning and in 12 games he finished with just 16 tackles, one sack, 14 QB pressures and a deflected pass.
“Lot of growing pains coming in, felt like I was building on something I had found early on before the injury, and that kind of just took me out of my head,” Sanders said. “Then being able to come back and get told you’re going to play defensive end. It’s kind of like, ‘Oh man,’ trying to pick that up, learn all the things that D-ends have to do.”
But now that the defense is being switched to an odd-man front under new coordinator Jim Leonhard, Sanders’ experience playing on the edge came in handy during the spring as he learned the new scheme.
“It definitely helps,” Leonhard said of the reps Sanders accrued last season. “You cannot get a substitute for playing time on Sundays, so every rep is huge for young players to get out there and learn and grow from. And obviously, as coaches, it gives you something to evaluate and try to have a better picture of where they’re going to fit. He’s a guy that’s really excited about the changes in the defense, and what he thinks his role can be in it. He’ll continue to grow and build what that’s going to be throughout the offseason and camp as well.”
Sanders won’t be playing edge rusher like he did last season; he’ll be in the 5-tech or 4i spot which will have him lined up on the outside shoulder of the guard, a little closer to where his old office was at tackle.
It should be a good spot for him because at 297 pounds, Sanders was initially drafted to be an Ed Oliver-type penetrating DT and he can still play that style in the new scheme.
“I feel like it’ll help a lot,” he said. “Being able to go outside, inside, having some experience in this league doing that will be big for me. I definitely feel like I’m coming in with much more confidence. I kind of know what to expect this year, seeing things all last year, multiple positions, having an awareness of what to really prepare for going into the season.”
It’s a crowded situation up front for Buffalo, so even though Sanders was a second-round pick, there are no guarantees on playing time.
After missing almost all of his rookie season, 2025 third-round pick Jackson has put on about 20 pounds and will be in the mix to play the 5-tech/4i, and there’s a chance the Bills might decide that’s the better position for free agent signee Mike Danna, 2025 fourth-round pick Deone Walker, or even 2026 fifth-round pick Zane Durant.
That’s the thing about the defensive line: For the most part we really don’t have any idea who is going to be playing where, and it’s even possible that Leonhard won’t be sure until the pads come on at training camp.
The offseason program was all about determining who can do what and how those individual skill sets fit into the overall unit, and Sanders is confident he’ll have a chair when the music stops.
“Having new coaches in here who come in and are telling you they believe in the type of player you are and the type of game that you play,” Sanders said. “And just the scheme, allowing me to have more one-on-ones than I previously had, or even being able to set certain things up where I can be able to play through a double team, or just this and that, allow me to be more true to myself.”
Sal Maiorana has covered the Buffalo Bills for more than four decades including 37 years as the full-time beat writer/columnist for the D&C. He has written numerous books about the history of the team, and he is also co-host of the BLEAV in Bills podcast/YouTube show. He can be reached at maiorana@gannett.com, and you can follow him on X @salmaiorana and on Bluesky @salmaiorana.bsky.social.
This article originally appeared on Rochester Democrat and Chronicle: TJ Sanders role in Bills defense could grow in 2026
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