5 reasons why the Buffalo Bills should not draft a WR in first round
By Joe Cook
As we are honing in on the highly anticipated 2024 NFL Draft, many people are expecting the Buffalo Bills to select a wide receiver in the first round. Before the team traded Stefon Diggs, fans were pounding the table for receiver help, after any receiver not named Khalil Shakir seemingly hung Josh Allen out to dry in the playoffs, again.
The current top three of the receiver room are Curtis Samuel, Shakir, and Mack Hollins. There is obviously a big hole there. However, taking a wide receiver in the first round might not make sense and there are multiple reasons why when you analyze it.
Reason No. 1: The top receivers will be gone by the time the Buffalo Bills pick
The big three receivers in this draft are Marvin Harrison Jr., Rome Odzune, and Malik Nabers. All of which are certain to be gone inside of the Top 15 picks. The Bills are currently settled all the way down at number 28. They are nowhere near any of those three guys who are immediate number-one wide receivers.
Granted, Buffalo Bills general manager Brandon Beane likes to get aggressive and trade up for his guys in round one, it just doesn’t seem plausible to get into the Top 15. It would cost a massive haul that starts with next year’s first and second-rounder, and then some.
The Bills are going through the second phase of the Josh Allen era, where they no longer have the luxury of a great quarterback on a rookie deal with minimal cap hit. They need to continue funneling in young talent on rookie contracts to sustain their success. Moving on from next year's premium picks already brings them to a big halt there.
The next best guy behind the big three is Brian Thomas Jr. He was a number two at LSU but has the potential to be a number one almost right away, and he could easily be gone by the 18th overall pick. Then you start getting into the second tier of receivers with guys like Adonai Mitchell and Ladd McConkey.
Both seem better suited as second-round picks. So the Bills are kind of caught between a rock and a hard place for a round-one receiver. You can either move massive draft capital and bank it all on one player and possibly deal a massive blow to what Beane has spent years building, or stay put and reach on a guy.