Systems, methods, and apparatuses involve a PHY coupled to a MAC. The PHY can include a drift buffer coupled to an output of a receiver and a bypass branch coupled to the output of the receiver. The PHY includes a clocking multiplexer that includes a first clock input coupled to a recovered clock of the PHY and a second clock input coupled to a p-clock of the MAC; and a clock output configured to output one of the recovered clock or the p-clock based on a selection input value. The PHY includes a bypass multiplexer that includes a first data input coupled to an output of a drift buffer and a second data input coupled to the bypass branch; and a data output configured to output one of the output of the drift buffer or data from the bypass branch based on the section input value of the clocking multiplexer.