If one was wondering how serious the Buffalo Bills were about making a push to the Super Bowl, you have your answer via Kenny Stills.
The Bills (13-3) who will face the Indianapolis Colts over the NFL’s Wild Card weekend on Saturday, fortified their roster on Monday by adding the veteran wideout. A former member of the Texans and Dolphins, Stills is likely a familiar name to Buffalo. But now he’s on the Bills sideline.
Before Stills starts getting after it with his new team this week, get to know him a bit. Here are 12 things to know about Buffalo’s newest wide receiver:
Experienced addition
When the Bills were rumored to have interest in Stills it turned some heads for one simple reason: He’s proven. Stills has produced in just about every place he’s been at in the NFL, which includes the Saints as well as the prior mentioned Dolphins and Texans.
Stills was a 2013 fifth-round pick of the Saints out of Oklahoma. The 6-foot-1 wideout ran an impressive 4.38 second 40-yard dash time at his combine. In 117 career games, Stills has 310 catches for 4,843 yards and 37 touchdowns.
Why was he available?
Simply put, it just didn’t workout this season in Houston for the 28-year-old playmaker. The Texans cut him in November when he was unable to find a role in their offense. In 10 games in 2020, Stills had 11 catches on 19 targets for 144 yards with a touchdown.
But the Texans were a team in-flux through this NFL season which just ended on Sunday. Head coach Bill O’Brien continued his questionable decision making which hit a fever pitch when he traded star receiver DeAndre Hopkins to the Cardinals. O’Brien then himself was let go.
The now 4-12 Texans, per ESPN, wanted to give Stills an opportunity to sign with a playoff team. It was called a “mutual” parting and nothing based off his production or injury. Stills did deal with a quad issue but will have had plenty of time to heal from that.
New practice squad rule
The Bills did not sign Stills to their active roster, but it doesn’t matter. Buffalo has called up players from their practice squad all throughout the year. Stills signed on the dotted line to join that group. So why doesn’t that matter?
The NFL announced last week there are new rules involving the practice squad. Previously a player could be only elevated from it twice this season. In the playoffs, that changes to an unlimited amount of times… so the practice squad is now mostly an extension of the 53-man roster.
Here’s an additional explanation of that via Bills Wire’s previous coverage:
According to NFL Network’s Tom Pelissero, the NFL and NFLPA agreed to remove the two-game restriction from practice squad standard elevations. Previously, players could only be activated to the 53-man roster from the practice squad twice without those players needing to clear waivers to return to the practice squad. Now, the NFL is allowing practice squad players to be elevated an unlimited number of times during the course of the playoffs.