Tag: Davis Webb

Which Bills players are unlikely to survive pre-training camp cuts?

Buffalo Bills pre-training camp cut candidates in 2020.

A series of big blows were dealt to bubble players and some fresh faces in the Buffalo Bills locker room this week.

First, the NFL and NFLPA jointly decided to cancel the 2020 preseason. While many hope in the future there are less preseason games, at least one or two could go a long way for such players to prove to a coaching staff they are worthy of a roster or practice squad spot.

Then things got even worse. Typically a team carries 90 players into training camp. In an effort to promote social distancing, teams will now carry only 80 when training camp gets started next week.

Most camps in the league are slated to begin next Tuesday, and just about every roster has more than 80 players on it currently. Among that faction is the Bills, who have 88. Buffalo general manager Brandon Beane and head coach Sean McDermott have some roster trimming to do.

So with that, which eight Bills players are most likely to be cut ahead of camp? Here’s our best 10 guesses at those spots:

Bills CB Ike Brown (Getty Images)

CB Ike Brown

You’ll notice a trend we’ll point out right away here with Ike Brown: This 80-man roster news is bad for undrafted rookie free agents. That’s what Brown was out of FIU. Brown has some desirable size at 6-foot tall, but he’s in a crowded cornerback room with EJ Gaines, Levi Wallace and Josh Norman already battling for a No. 2 job next to Tre’Davious White.

 

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Former Georgia QB Jake Fromm signs with Bills — contract details here

Former Georgia football QB and 2020 NFL Draft pick Jake Fromm signed his rookie contract with the Buffalo Bills. Here are the details…

Former Georgia quarterback Jake Fromm signed his rookie deal on Friday with the Buffalo Bills.

According to Aaron Wilson of the Houston Chronicle, it’s a four-year contract worth $3.7 million total, $899,490 guaranteed with a $302,960 signing bonus.

A pedestrian combine performance reportedly caused Fromm to slip to the fifth-round of the 2020 NFL Draft where the Buffalo Bills felt fortunate to select him with the No. 167 overall pick.

General manager Brandon Beane said that drafting Fromm was not meant to send a message to Bills starter Josh Allen, but rather to fill a “premium position” with a talented player.

Fromm will have an opportunity to compete for the backup position this off-season with fellow Bills quarterbacks Davis Webb and Matt Barkley. And as Georgia fans know well, don’t count Fromm out in a quarterback competition. He has beaten out a couple of 5-stars before and won a few games in between…

 

LOOK: Josh Allen, Bills stack beer at Sabres game

Josh Allen, Dawson Knox, and Buffalo Bills teammates at the Buffalo Sabres game vs. Toronto Maple Leafs.

On Sunday, the NHL’s Buffalo Sabres topped the Toronto Maple Leafs, 5-2. It looks like Josh Allen and some of his Bills teammates are back in Buffalo.

Allen and a small group, including backup QB Davis Webb, and tight ends Dawson Knox and Tommy Sweeney were among them:

Aside from that team-produced photo, one fan caught and even better one from the game’s television broadcast. The “boys” were having a well-deserved offseason night off, checking out the Sabres’ win and stacking some beers along the way:

Perhaps a winning formula for the hockey team? Might have the run this idea one more time, fellas.

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The Senior Bowl has been a quarterback factory for Giants

The Senior Bowl has been a quarterback factory for the New York Giants, but chances are that’s going to change in 2020.

The New York Giants have an extensive scouting department that covers the country from coast to coast but there’s one place they seem to concentrate on the most, and that’s Ladd-Peeples Stadium in Mobile, Alabama.

That’s the site of the annual Senior Bowl where players who have completed their college eligibility get a chance to showcase their wares for NFL personnel people.

The Giants’ brass is usually there in numbers and put a lot of weight in the game when it comes to their draft board. They have selected the MVP of the game the past three years, all quarterbacks: Davis Webb, Cal (2017), Kyle Lauletta, Richmond (2018) and Duke’s Daniel Jones last year.

Webb and Lauletta, third- and fourth-round picks respectively, are no longer Giants, while Jones, taken sixth overall in last year’s draft, is the future of the franchise.

Usually, the general managers and scouts don’t stick around for the actual game, they just watch the practices and conduct the interviews. It’s difficult to gauge a player’s worth in an all-star game anyway.

Last year, Giants GM Dave Gettleman, still up in the air about certain quarterbacks, wanted to see them play in a live game, Jones in particularly.

So he stayed.

“Watching them on tape is one thing, seeing them in the environment is definitely, I think, very important. Saw Drew (Lock), Daniel, Jarrett Stidham, (Gardner) Minshew, (Trace) McSorley, all of these guys were at the Senior Bowl, so I decided to stay,” Gettleman told reporters last year.

“I made up my mind that I was staying for the game and, frankly, he (Jones) walked out there and I saw a professional quarterback after the three series that I watched. I saw a professional quarterback.”

The rest you know. Gettleman fell “full bloom” in love with Jones and over-drafted him. No one is complaining about that now.

What we do wonder is who Gettleman will be smitten with this year. He doesn’t need a quarterback and many of the big defensive players are underclassman, so it will be fun to watch his reaction during this game. That is, if he stays for it.

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State of the position: Bills quarterbacks

Here is the state of the Buffalo Bills’ quarterbacks entering the 2020 offseason.

Here is Bills Wire’s position-by-position breakdown of the team’s roster, starting with quarterback, including the season that was a projecting forward:

Buffalo Bills quarterback Josh Allen. Credit: Rich Barnes-USA TODAY Sports

Quarterbacks

The Bills quarterback situation is one of the most stable spots on the team’s roster. Josh Allen took some steps forward in his second season in a Buffalo uniform.

Allen started all 16 games, and it’s apparent that the Bills’ brass is all in with supporting Allen. He increased his completion percentage by six percent, doubled his passing touchdowns, decreased the number of interceptions thrown, and improved his passing yards per game by 19. He added nine rushing touchdowns as well.

There’s still some growth that needs to take place in Allen’s game. There were moments when he tried to do a bit too much when better decisions would do. However, as he finds greater consistency throughout his attack and further reduce the number of questionable decisions that occur during games, he will challenge others as a top-10 quarterback in the league.

Backup Matt Barkley played in two games last year, coming in for Allen after the Wyoming product entered concussion protocol in Week 4 against the New England Patriots. He also played the majority of the Week 17 matchup against the New York Jets, a game that reflected more a preseason tilt than anything else.

Buffalo Bills quarterback Matt Barkle. Credit: Rich Barnes-USA TODAY Sports

Contract situation

Both of Buffalo’s quarterbacks are under contract for the 2020 season. Allen’s cap hit is $5.7 million as part of his rookie contract. He won’t be an unrestricted free agent until 2022, so the Bills won’t have to mess around with price increase on their potential franchise quarterback until they revisit his contract for the fifth-year option. Barkley enters the final year of a two-year contract.

The future

Allen is the unquestioned focal point of the Bills offense. Barkley will most likely be the team’s backup for the second-consecutive season.

The only way this situation will change is if Buffalo decides that they can find an upgrade at the position behind Allen, or if the team kept three quarterbacks on their roster moving forward. Davis Webb spent the 2019 season as Buffalo’s “third” QB, but was on the practice squad. If Allen were to miss substantial time, it’s questionable if Barkley could shoulder the load. However, with so much faith is placed in Allen’s hands, it’s not likely Buffalo would make a move to find a quarterback who has any chance of challenging Allen’s reign.

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Bills sign 10 players to reserve/ future contracts

Buffalo Bills sign 10 players to contracts.

The Bills  announced on Monday that the team came to terms with 10 players on a reserve/ future contract.

The contract type keeps a player tied to a team but it doesn’t go into effect until the new league year in 2020. Typically the type of contract is used for practice squad players.

The 10 players signed by the Bills were:

  • TE Nate Becker
  • LB Tyrel Dodson
  • WR Nick Easley
  • CB Cam Lewis
  • WR Ray-Ray McCloud
  • LB Del’Shawn Phillips
  • OL Victor Salako
  • RB Christian Wade
  • QB Davis Webb
  • DE Jonathan Woodard

Of note on the signees, McCloud was a sixth-round pick of the Bills in 2018, was cut earlier this year, signed with the Panthers and re-signed with the Bills after Carolina cut him. Lewis attended the University at Buffalo and spent the entire season on Buffalo’s practice squad.

Wade was the Bills’ internationally allocated player who used to be a rugby star. Woodard signed with the Bills just last week when Eddie Yarbrough signed with the Vikings. Dodson was a undrafted rookie signee of the Bills who was placed on the exempt list year as the NFL investigated an off-field issue involving him. Webb is the guy in the photo above, he was on Buffalo’s practice squad all year.

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