2023 Bills Preseason Retrospective

Howdy y’all. This is gonna be a new series, the first one I’ve been blessed with as a writer at BF. Throughout the upcoming season, I am going to be doing quarterly evaluations of our Buffalo Bills. The focus will be players who are performing well, those who are struggling, as well as what I would like to see the team do differently, or keep doing to maintain success.

In this article, we will take a look at the preseason. Before getting into specifics, I feel obligated to slap a giant warning: THE PRESEASON IS BASICALLY MEANINGLESS. Now that that is out of the way, let’s start with some players who stood out to me.

OG O’Cyrus Torrence

The 2nd round guard out of Florida has had a very impressive summer, and that was on display this preseason. In spite of what appeared to be a poor outing against the Steelers (speaking on the o-line specifically, not holistically), Torrence put a decent performance on tape. His strength and anchor were on display all preseason and it appears as though he worked his way into a starting job.

WR Andy Isabella 

The (newest) darling of the Bills Mafia did put together a solid preseason, making the most of his opportunity. He displayed his great speed, and ability as a kick returner (the man purposely fumbled a ball on a return which resulted in us getting 15 extra yards… Phenomenal awareness!)

*As I wrote this, news broke that he was cut. Now, he’s on the practice squad. Welcome back!

CB Christian Benford

The former 6th round pick out of Villanova had a very very solid preseason. He has done enough to solidify himself as CB2 outside of Tre White in my opinion. His showing against new star Bears WR DJ Moore was nothing short of impressive. It is quite a feat for a 6th rounder to handedly beat out a 1st rounder in the same position group.

Speaking of which….

CB Kaiir Elam

We’ve touched on some positives, now for the not so positives. Former 1st round pick Kaiir Elam is currently slotted as CB4 (CB5 if you wanna include Taron Johnson but they really play different positions entirely). He has had issues with being a bit too handsy, which is something that can be remedied. His main issues however, seem to be from a schematic standpoint. Elam is more of a sticky man corner and hasn’t been properly incorporated into our defense.

To be fair, he also has not been given a chance. Major mismanagement from Beane and Co. so far. This leads me to believe that he could be a trade candidate. He is very talented and has all the traits you want in a corner, he just hasn’t been given the opportunity to grow in our system. I could see why a team would take a chance on him. We will see what happens.

The MLB room as a whole 

Who could’ve seen letting Tremaine Edmunds walk and doing (*checks notes*) absolutely nothing at the position would’ve been bad? Not me! It’s gonna be a long year in this position group. (Dodson? More look “Doo-doo-son”.) The Buffalo Bills better hope Terrel Bernard or Dorian Williams can perform competently. Or maybe they bring in a veteran as cut day continues, but man, what a major mess up from Beane in this department.

QB2

Kyle Allen is not great. Bitcoin Barkley is not great. If 17 goes down, “we’re fucked”. It is what it is at that point. Beane was in on Trey Lance at least, which would’ve been sick. I expect a slight upgrade at QB2 if one is available.

It is tough to take away many concrete points from the preseason, I feel like it is really grasping at straws. Once the regular season hits there will be more legit takeaways and, thus, a more legit retrospective on our Buffalo Bills. Buckle up for a fun season.

Featured Image: Jeffrey T. Barnes/AP