Matt Araiza shows off strong leg during Buffalo Bills OTAs

Matt Araiza (Mandatory Credit: Darren Yamashita-USA TODAY Sports)
Matt Araiza (Mandatory Credit: Darren Yamashita-USA TODAY Sports)

The Buffalo Bills rookie punter had some impressive punts during OTAs on Tuesday

The scouting report on Matt Araiza entering the NFL Draft was that he had one of the strongest legs in this year’s draft class. This wasn’t necessarily surprising considering he had five punts last year travel more than 70 yards while at San Diego State University and averaged over 50 yards per punt.

The Buffalo Bills would draft Araiza in the sixth round and he is now expected to compete with Matt Haack for the starting job this summer.

On Tuesday, the Buffalo Bills started their second week of OTAs and Matthew Bove with WKBW captured some highlights of Araiza kicking and the punts are impressive.

This will be one of the top training camp battles for the Buffalo Bills but may end up coming down to who does a better job holding for Tyler Bass on field goal attempts.

Who was back returning punts for the Buffalo Bills?

While the focus was on Araiza in the video, we also get a glimpse of who might be returning punts for the Buffalo Bills. In the videos, three players are back fielding the punts and they include undrafted free agents Raheem Blackshear and Malik Williams as well as sixth round pick from last year Marquez Stevenson.

Stevenson got a chance to return punts in the second half of last year in place of Isaiah McKenzie and had 14 punt returns with an average of 9.4 yards per punt. However, he did have two fumbles on punt returns.

As for Blackshear and Williams, both have experience returning kicks from college however a majority of Blackshear’s experience comes from returning kickoffs.

This will be another top training camp battle to watch for the Buffalo Bills as these three are likely to be joined by Isaiah McKenzie, Micah Hyde, and Khalil Shakir in competing for the punt return job. According to Matt Parrino, Hyde was among a number of players absent from practice on Tuesday, and Khalil Shakir was working off to the side with trainers.

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