ORCHARD PARK — As Brandon Beane ticked through his new draft class, a common word kept appearing.
Versatility.
It’s something the Buffalo Bills general manager has talked about often over the last few years. But now that he has full control of football operations, Beane has shown more action than talk this offseason.
From second-round pick T.J. Parker to fourth-round picks Jude Bowry and Skyler Bell and fifth-round picks Jalon Kilgore and Zane Durant, Beane mentioned versatility in every one of them.
It has even spread to the veteran players acquired this year, from wide receiver D.J. Moore to nickelback Dee Alford to safety C.J. Gardner-Johnson. Beane has made it clear he wants players who can play multiple positions and have varied skills within those positions.
The question, though, is how much versatility is necessary? Sean McDermott was certainly a rigid coach who wanted players who fit his culture and system, which is how the Bills ended up running it back with Tre’Davious White, Jordan Poyer, Jordan Phillips and Shaq Lawson last year.
“I told the guys on the team, we’re going to draft guys in your position,” Bills head coach Joe Brady said. “That’s going to elevate everybody. We want guys that are going to compete. I want to go out to practice for OTAs and training camp and there’s guys fighting for jobs. It’s only going to make our team better.”
Beane has attempted to add versatility in the past and it either didn’t work out or was rebuffed by the coaching staff. Certainly injuries limited wide receiver Curtis Samuel’s two seasons with the Bills, but they also didn’t seem to have a plan for him when he was healthy.
Running back Nyheim Hines — a player who was effective as a runner and could split wide as a receiver — was acquired at the 2022 trade deadline and he was used sparingly on offense. Perhaps no player in the Beane-McDermott era was more of a square peg in a round hole than 2022 first-round pick Kaiir Elam.
Elam was a man-to-man cornerback in college and was drafted into a zone-heavy Bills scheme. From his rookie season until the Bills finally dealt him to the Dallas Cowboys for a fifth-round pick last year, Elam bobbed between being a starter to a healthy scratch.
Even though it didn’t work out for Elam in Dallas or Tennessee last year, no one will ever truthfully know if Elam was simply a bust or if the flip-flopping damaged his confidence beyond repair. Regardless, making a player a healthy scratch one week because he supposedly can’t play special teams and starting him on defense the following week isn’t normal roster building.
That’s what makes the second-round selection of Ohio State cornerback Davison Igbinosun so intriguing. Igbinosun specializes in press man and he’s slotted behind Christian Benford and last year’s first-round pick Maxwell Hairston, both of whom were taken to fit into McDermott’s zone defense.
One of the top storylines through training camp and into the season will be whether Igbinosun’s selection was actually about having an injury insurance policy and versatility, or if the Bills question whether Benford or Hairston fit into new defensive coordinator Jim Leonhard’s defense. Because Beane even acknowledged Igbinosun would have to work on his off coverage skills.
“Benford and Max, those are two different skill sets. I think this is a third skill set,” Beane said moments after drafting Igbinosun. “… The best thing he does is press. Some guys are man-mash, some guys are best in off (coverage). I think he gives us another added skill set.”
McDermott’s staff didn’t completely scoff at versatility. He used Michael Hoecht in a variety of roles, albeit for 1 ½ games. Former offensive line coach Aaron Kromer was also high on Alec Anderson’s ability to play four positions, while last year’s sixth-round pick Chase Lundt could play guard and tackle and even Connor McGovern played his first season in Buffalo at left guard before moving to center.
And, of course, Cam Lewis was a personal favorite of McDermott’s for his ability to bounce between nickelback and safety. But the player Beane has mentioned multiple times this offseason, and never seemed to be viewed in the same regard under the previous staff, is Javon Solomon.
Solomon was a curious pick in the fifth round of the 2024 NFL Draft. He just wasn’t built like any defensive end the Bills ever drafted. And the preference hasn’t seemed to change since McDermott’s departure.
The Bills either want long and lean edge players like Greg Rousseau, or sturdy players like Parker, Hoecht and Bradley Chubb, who are all roughly 6-foot-3 and 260 pounds. Solomon is 6-1 and 245, and even with a wingspan over 6-8 and 10 ¾-inch hands, his body just doesn’t match the rest.
Solomon rarely played with his hand on the ground at Troy and was considered a designated pass rusher upon draft day. Even though Solomon found a role as a key special teams player, he couldn’t regularly crack the defensive end rotation.
Suspensions to Von Miller in 2024 and Hoecht in 2025 seemed to be prime opportunities to slip into the rotation. It never happened.
Even after Solomon found some brief success in Hoecht’s Joker role after his torn Achilles tendon, it didn’t last long. Solomon couldn’t even get on the field after the Bills were embattled with injuries on the edge, opting instead to play rookie defensive tackle T.J. Sanders at defensive end near the end of the season.
But Beane believes that after logging just 20% of the defensive snaps last year despite appearing in every game, the 2023 Division I sack king might be a better fit in Leonhard’s 3-4 scheme.
“When Jim came in and talked to our scouts that day, he was like, ‘Don’t chase players. Bring me good football players. We’ll make it work,’” Beane said. “This doesn’t have to be a one-year flip-it-all-around. … That’s refreshing because it takes a little bit of angst of, ‘Holy cow, if I don’t get this done in free agency or the draft, I’m kind of setting this team up for failure.’”