Bills Day 4 observations: WR injuries piling up, while backup QB battle intensifies

New York Times

a day ago

PITTSFORD, N.Y. — Most days at training camp practices pass with all players making it through each day, perhaps with a minor injury here or there, but nothing too serious. But every so often, there's a stark reminder of football's cruelty. One of those occurred on the final snap of Bills practice Sunday.
Advertisement
Wide receiver Tyrell Shavers, who had already been earning increased opportunities through just the first four days of training camp and seemed like a real threat to make the 53-man roster, ran a route against 2025 first-round pick and cornerback Maxwell Hairston in the goal-line area. Shavers won the rep in 11-on-11 and popped open in the end zone to bring in a well-thrown pass from quarterback Mike White for a touchdown.
Shavers jumped up for the catch and landed initially in the end zone without a problem, then at the tail end of the rep, Hairston attempted to jar the ball loose. As the play continued, Shavers crumbled to the ground and immediately grabbed the foot and ankle area on his right leg.
'He ran an under, a shallow route,' Hairston said of the play. 'That's just us competing — me being a corner, not trying to allow the receiver to catch the ball.'
Shavers was immediately surrounded by multiple members of the team's athletic training staff. Within a few minutes, the majority of the roster was around Shavers and those attending to him. HBO's 'Hard Knocks' cameras were heading toward the quickly piling up huddle, and franchise quarterback Josh Allen swiftly shooed the camera away from the close-up shot.
After a few moments, the cart came over for Shavers. Unable to put any weight on his right leg, he was loaded onto the cart and headed back to the locker room for further examination.
As Shavers was being tended to, cornerbacks coach Jahmile Addae went over to have a conversation with Hairston — a potential teaching moment for the young player the Bills hope will be their future at cornerback.
'Just be smart. You know, we're in practice, at the end of the day we're competing,' Hairston said of Addae's message to him. 'But these are our teammates. Just to be smart on the finish.'
Advertisement
Hairston said he needed to go back and see the play to see what he could have done differently at the end of the rep. It's officially an ankle injury for Shavers, according to the team.
Here's what else stood out from Day 4 of Bills camp on what was possibly their last ramp-up day before full pads go on Monday.
The Bills were fortunate enough to have Shavers make it through the majority of the practice because they needed him. It happens every year at one specific position, where injuries just pile up, which makes it challenging to get through a full day of practice. Shavers is now one of the five different injuries the 13-player receiver room is dealing with. The Bills have been without Laviska Shenault since the start of camp. They lost Curtis Samuel — close to a lock for the team — early on Day 3 to a hamstring injury. Then the Bills suffered three more receiver injuries Sunday. One was to Shavers at the end of the practice and another was to Elijah Moore, the current favorite to make the team as the fifth receiver. Moore didn't take part in team drills after going through some seven-on-seven reps earlier on Sunday due to general leg soreness. Seventh-round rookie Kaden Prather also missed time Sunday, as he sported a wrap on his upper leg as the practice went on.
If none of the five injured players return for Monday, that leaves the Bills with only eight receivers to take reps throughout the day. And three of those injured players — Samuel, Moore and Shavers — were getting considerable time with the first-team offense. Even before Shavers had the injury, the Bills were giving some Josh Allen reps to players like Jalen Virgil, KJ Hamler, Stephen Gosnell and Kristian Wilkerson. As cruel as injuries can be, they're also a lifeline to depth players trying to make the team or practice squad. These next few days could wind up being the best opportunity the likes of Virgil, Hamler, Gosnell and Wilkerson could have all summer.
The other new injury that seemingly popped up out of nowhere was to starting middle linebacker Terrel Bernard, who missed Sunday's session with a hamstring injury. It has yet to be determined if that, or any of the new injuries, are serious ones. The Bills are trying to get a lot of new pieces on defense on the same page, so not having the defensive play caller available to them is undoubtedly a bit of a setback, should he continue to miss time in training camp. Though with that disappointment comes an opportunity for them to gain more information in what is one of their more important depth decisions this summer — who Bernard's primary backup will be.
Advertisement
To begin camp, the Bills rewarded second-year linebacker and Buffalo-native Joe Andreessen with the second-team reps likely for the work he put in and progress he made during spring practices. Andreessen was notably ahead of Baylon Spector, who, when healthy in 2024, served as Bernard's top backup and even started some games for the Bills last season. The problem for Spector, who may qualify for defensive coordinator Bobby Babich's subtle message on Friday to be available, is that Spector has been injured quite a lot during his three-year Bills career, and even picked up an injury in the spring.
Without Bernard, the Bills split up the first-team middle linebacker work between Spector and Andreessen. It's generally tougher to gauge performance of linebackers in a training camp practice because, outside of a handful of live tackling reps each summer, there really isn't an opportunity to finish plays with a tackle — which is a big part of the job. However, both players can at the very least demonstrate their coverage ability, how they read and react to run plays and how they can serve as a connector with teammates before the snap. While Andreessen is a likely lock for the 53-man roster, the same can't be said for Spector, who needs a healthy and good camp to secure his spot as the team's fifth or sixth linebacker.
At least in one area, the Bills will hope that 2025 provides the same outcome as every other season since 2019 — for Josh Allen to be healthy enough to start every game. If that happens, the competition this summer at backup quarterback won't matter much. But Allen has a certain playing style as a mobile quarterback who extends plays, making what they do with the quarterback depth chart pretty important.
Last year, Mitchell Trubisky was the coast-to-coast backup to Allen, though even in spot duty and during the preseason, his performances were somewhat uninspiring. Then the Bills brought in Mike White as their third quarterback and then signed him through 2025 once they called him up to the 53-man roster at the end of the year. It created the potential for Trubisky and White to battle it out for the backup job in 2025, but it was hard to determine if that was reality early on, given their overall adoration for Trubisky. The team has talked about competition at spots before, but with how they handle reps in practice doesn't always indicate a true competition.
However, after seeing the full breakdown of reps at camp through four days, the Bills are giving both Trubisky and White an equal amount of time with the second-team offense, effectively saying, 'may the best quarterback win.' Through four days in camp, White has looked like the better player. Although White did throw an interception Sunday, it was more of a fantastic play by the cornerback in coverage than it was a bad pass. White is the superior quarterback in the pocket and has made sharp reads while delivering a good ball to his targets for the most part. Trubisky has had his moments as well, and provides more of a mobile threat than White, but his accuracy has not been as strong and he has been a bit more hesitant in the pocket than White. To this point, White has been the better of the two, though this competition is likely to go through the third preseason game.
By the end of the season in 2024, the Bills felt as if their confidence in kicker Tyler Bass was vindicated in how he performed down the stretch. From the start of November through the end of the season and including playofffs, Bass hit 20 of his 22 field goal attempts (91 percent), and 40 of 43 extra point attempts (93 percent), erasing a lot of the shakiness he had heading into the season.
That confidence carried over into the start of training camp in 2025, as Bass went perfect on all six attempts on Day 1, with a long of 48 and most of the kicks coming from 40-plus. But on his next field goal opportunity in team drills on Sunday, it went considerably worse. As a cell of moderate-to-heavy rain hovered over Bills practice for about half an hour, Bass was tasked with kicking through that rain, and made only four of his eight attempts.
Advertisement
The makes were from 33, 39, 45 and 50, with the misses from 43, 45, 48 and 50 yards. Bass missed the initial 50-yard kick and made the second with a second chance at it. The majority of his misses were just a hair outside the uprights, so it wasn't as though he was shanking them all practice, but it's nonetheless a correction he'll need to make ahead of his next session. For camp, Bass is 4-for-4 from 30 to 39 yards, 5-for-8 from 40 to 49 yards and 1-for-2 from 50-plus.
Day 4 MVP, CB Ja'Marcus Ingram: Ingram made the play of the day by perfectly high-pointing White's pass intended for tight end Zach Davidson and completed the catch for an interception. Later in the session, working against Allen and first-team receiver Keon Coleman near the goal line, Coleman got the better of a contested catch opportunity near the sideline — but it was a highly competitive rep and the team had them go at it again on the very next play. Ingram dominated that contested rep and broke up the pass, splitting the results in half with Coleman. Ingram will need a really good camp and preseason to make the team this year, and days like Sunday certainly help his cause.
Did not participate: RT Spencer Brown (back, active PUP), C Sedrick Van-Pran Granger (calf, active PUP), WR Laviska Shenault (lower leg, non-football injury list), TE Dawson Knox (hamstring, non-football injury list), LB Dorian Williams (calf), WR Curtis Samuel (hamstring), LB Terrel Bernard (hamstring).
(Top photo of Tyrell Shavers: Shawn Dowd / Rochester Democrat and Chronicle via Imagn Images)