The Buffalo Bills will close out their 2025 season, and over 50 seasons at Highmark Stadium, next Sunday against the New York Jets. Though the Bills are locked into a playoff spot, head coach Sean McDermott assured that the team will make player availability decisions with the intent to win the game.
In short, it seems the Bills won’t be resting starters. Still, Buffalo won’t have much say-so in their seeding, instead waiting to see how Week 18 falls around the league to know where they’ll play their Wild Card round matchup.
Nonetheless, the Bills have a number of key injuries to monitor as the season comes to a close and the postseason comes into focus.
Injury updates give Buffalo Bills decisions to make before playoffs begin
McDermott only gave one firm update, declaring linebacker Terrel Bernard out after suffering a calf injury last Sunday against Philadelphia. Bernard has struggled with staying healthy this season, having already missed four games.
McDermott said Bernard’s injury will be monitored week-to-week, so Bills fans can hold out hope the impressive young linebacker will return for the postseason.
As for quarterback Josh Allen, who got another X-ray on his injured foot after Sunday's game, McDermott compared the injury to last week, noting that the QB still had some soreness and that the team would monitor him throughout the week. While Allen doesn't have to play against New York, there certainly doesn't appear to be any indication that he won't suit up for the season finale.
Following earlier news on Monday that the team had released kicker Michael Badgley from the practice squad, McDermott did not confirm that Matt Prater will return this week.
“Matt Prater seems to be moving in the right direction,” McDermott said. “Don’t know for sure yet, but I feel like we’re heading in the right direction there, and he should be back this week. But we’ll know more over the next day or two when he gets a chance to kick some more for us here.”
Certainly, with Badgley out of the picture, the Bills seem confident Prater will make his return. Still, Bills fans will need to monitor the injury report this week to be sure that he will, in fact, kick for the team in the season finale.
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McDermott also classified Dalton Kincaid, DaQuan Jones, Jordan Phillips, and Jordan Poyer as “improving”, adding that the team will monitor them throughout the week to gauge their availability.
Regardless of whether any of these banged-up players can go against New York, it’s much more important that they are available when the postseason begins. As such, it wouldn’t be too surprising if the Bills let these players rest up another week to make sure they’re as close to 100% for a postseason run as possible.