Taylor Rapp

4 seasons as a Rams starter (188 tackles), 3 as a Bills rotational safety — the same player on two different career arcs.

The 2019 second-round pick out of Washington was a plug-and-play starter for the Rams from day one — 52 tackles as a rookie, 55 as a 3rd-year safety on the Super Bowl LVI run.

The Bills signing in 2023 reset his role: 27 → 42 → 17 tackles in three years tells the story of a depth piece, not a starter. The 2025 line (17 tackles, 0 PD) is the lowest of his career.

Super Bowl LVI champion — was on the field for the 2021 Rams' title run with 55 tackles in the regular season.

Rapp's 2021 season — 55 tackles, 1.5 sacks, 6 pass defenses — was the most complete year of his career. He started 13 regular-season games for the Rams and was on the active roster for the SB LVI playoff run that beat the Bengals.

The championship credential is genuine: a 3rd-year starter at safety for a top-5 NFL defense (the Aaron Donald / Jalen Ramsey unit). It also remains the high-water mark of his playing time arc.

Rams Rapp: 47 tackles per season. Bills Rapp: 29 tackles per season.

The drop-off isn't a decline so much as a role change. As a Rams starter he averaged 47 tackles a year; as a Bills rotational safety he averages 28.7 a year. Pass-defense rate fell from 5.8/yr to 3.0/yr in the same window.

His career-best year for pass defenses was his rookie year — 8 PD as a 21-year-old.

The 8 pass defenses as a rookie stayed the career high through 7 seasons. The 2024 spike (7 PD) was a brief return to that activity level, but 2025's zero is the eyebrow-raise — across his 17 tackles he didn't break up a single pass, the cleanest split between volume and impact in his career.

Career 274 tackles — quieter than Buffalo S peers, but with a ring most of them don't have.

Among 2019 draft-class safeties, Rapp's 274 career tackles is mid-pack. The differentiator on his résumé is the 2021 LVI ring — only Thornhill (KC LVII/LVIII) outpaces him on hardware among that class. Career longevity in the league at 7 seasons is itself the case for sticking.

34 pass defenses over 7 seasons — top-end coverage instinct, even as the playing time has shrunk.

Rapp's career 34 pass defenses averages out to ~5 PD/yr — that's a starter's coverage rate, even with three years of part-time work folded in. The 2024 BUF season (42 tackles, 7 PD, 1 FF) was the best Bills year of his contract, and proves the coverage profile still plays when he's on the field.

The 2025 step back (17 tackles, 0 PD) is more about snap allocation than skill regression — a year where the Bills' young safety room (Bishop, Hamlin, Hyde) crowded him to a special-teams-plus role.