Buffalo has 9 draft picks in the 2020 NFL Draft after acquiring a sixth-round pick from New England.
Buffalo Bills Insider Chris Brown provides the details.
Buffalo’s roster is a lot more talented and deeper in its third year under general manager Brandon Beane and head coach Sean McDermott. It has prompted NFL clubs to call One Bills Drive, looking to pry away some talent before final cuts are made. That’s why it’s no surprise that for the second time in two days the Bills executed a trade.
A day after moving offensive lineman Wyatt Teller to Cleveland in a trade with the Browns, the Bills send veteran offensive lineman Russell Bodine to the Patriots in exchange for a 2020 sixth-round pick.
New England clearly had a need at center after their starter David Andrews was hospitalized with a blood clot in his lungs. He has since been released from the hospital, but there is no known prognosis on a return of any kind for the 2019 season.
Bodine originally was signed by the Bills as a free agent last year and made 10 starts for Buffalo in 2018. He battled through injury last season and had a pair of offseason surgeries this past winter, including one on his shoulder.
Through the course of training camp Bodine did not get many reps with the starting unit. Bodine lined up at guard in the team’s final preseason game Thursday night.
The five-year veteran will provide depth at the center spot behind Ted Karras and James Ferentz, who are first and second on the Patriots depth chart in the pivot in the absence of Andrews.
Knowing a good number of teams are calling Buffalo trying to acquire talent before cuts are made is a strong indication as to the job the Bills personnel department has done in building a strong roster that goes well beyond who their top 53 players might be when final cuts are made on Saturday at 4 pm.
Buffalo now has nine draft choices lined up for the 2020 draft with three in round six after the trade with New England.
Bills trade OL Wyatt Teller
When there are just a couple of days before NFL rosters must be trimmed to 53, general managers make a lot of phone calls to see if some capable talent on other rosters can be pried away via trade before a player is available to the entire league on waivers.
Cleveland GM John Dorsey was looking to do just that with Buffalo GM Brandon Beane as the Bills traded OL Wyatt Teller and a 2021 seventh-round pick to the Browns in exchange for a fifth and sixth round picks in 2020.
Teller, 24, a former fifth-round pick of the Bills in 2018, started the final seven games of his rookie year at left guard.
The club’s veteran free agent additions this past offseason moved Teller back down the depth chart this spring and summer as he largely lined up with the second unit through training camp and the preseason.
The emergence of other young linemen like Ike Boettger and the recently acquired Ryan Bates, likely made the club more comfortable with the move from a depth perspective.
Bills place DE Mike Love on I-R; waive OL De’Ondre Wesley
The Bills made a pair of roster moves late Wednesday. Buffalo placed DE Mike Love on injured reserve and waived OL De’Ondre Wesley in an injury settlement.
Love had put together a strong offseason and training camp after adding seven to eight pounds of lean muscle mass to his frame and improving his explosion off the line. He likely would’ve been one of the final considerations for the fourth defensive end spot on the roster, but suffered a pectoral injury in the preseason game against Detroit that landed him on I-R.
The second-year pass rusher spent most of the 2018 campaign on Buffalo’s practice squad, but appeared in three games for the Bills at the end of last season.
Buffalo also waived De’Ondre Wesley in an injury settlement. Wesley has not been able to practice for some time due to a knee injury.
The Bills roster now stands at 88 players and one exemption in RB Christian Wade.