• Benford put together a strong 2023 season: Benford finished the 2023 season as the No. 13 player in PFF’s cornerback rankings.
• His 2024 campaign is off to a tremendous start: Benford ranked first in PFF’s cornerback rankings heading into Week 2.
• Unlock your edge with a PFF+ subscription: Get full access to all our in-season fantasy tools, including weekly rankings, WR/CB matchup charts, weekly projections, the Start-Sit Optimizer and more. Sign up now!
Estimated Reading Time: 3 minutes
Two weeks into the 2024 NFL season, there’s a big storyline emerging in Buffalo.
While most of the plaudits for the Buffalo Bills rightfully go to their offense, led by Josh Allen, cornerback Christian Benford continues to exceed expectations on defense.
On a unit that features future Hall of Famer Von Miller and high-profile former first-round draft picks in interior defensive lineman Ed Oliver and edge defender Greg Rousseau, Benford just might be the team's best player on that side of the ball.
It won’t come as a surprise to Bills fans and those who have been watching his film since the start of the 2023 NFL season, but Benford is wildly underrated.
He has played 83 coverage snaps through two weeks of the 2024 NFL season, and has earned an 81.3 PFF coverage grade that ranks sixth among cornerbacks. Benford was targeted just once in the Bills’ season-opening win over the Arizona Cardinals, but he didn’t give up a reception on that target.
While he did allow four receptions in a Week 2 Thursday Night Football win over the Miami Dolphins, that came on nine targets. And the catches went for just 25 yards, with only one reception resulting in a first down. Through the first two games of the 2024 season, Benford has the same number of interceptions as first downs allowed in coverage — one.
He headlined PFF’s cornerback rankings ahead of Week 2, with PFF's John Kosko saying, “Benford finished the 2023 season as the 13th-best cornerback in the NFL, and he starts this season on top after an impressive Week 1 performance. He played 32 meaningful coverage snaps (we removed screen passes from the data set) and was targeted just once. His advanced grading was outstanding, with a 100% positive grade rate and no downgrades in Week 1.”
Along with his impressive coverage performance, Benford's tackling has been a major positive. He has more tackles resulting in a defensive stop, two, than missed tackles, zero, through two weeks. That was one of his biggest strengths in 2023, too, with Benford missing just 1.9% of his tackle attempts — a clip that ranked second among all players at the position.
If you weren’t already aware of Benford, now is a good time to start paying attention. There’s every chance he will be universally regarded as one of the league’s best cornerbacks by the end of this season.
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