Bills GM Brandon Beane, on his Draft Picks: `I Feel They all Have a Legit Chance'
Brandon Beane on Saturday evening made a compelling case for every one of his eight picks in this year's NFL Draft.
From his first pick, Florida cornerback Kaiir Elam, to his last, Clemson linebacker Baylon Spector, he believes all could wind up on the 53-man roster, which arguably was the best and deepest in the league before the Draft.
"I'm excited about some of these late guys," he said in press conference to wrap up the Draft, "maybe even more than some of the other years. I think a lot of these guys have a legit chance to make our roster. I know people sometimes are like, `well, get rid of your picks, they're not going to make it.'
"I mean, we needed some depth in some certain areas and I feel they all have a legit chance."
Powerful words from the architect of a roster that's already championship-caliber.
It all flowed after Beane sweated out the acquisition of Florida cornerback Kaiir Elam late in the first round.
By the time the Baltimore Ravens were on the clock at No. 23, Elam was the last player left on the board that had been assigned a first-round grade by the Bills. So Beane exhaled after being able to convince the Ravens to swap picks in a trade that allowed the Bills to move up from 25.
It cost them their fourth-round pick, but it was more than worth it.
"Getting Kaiir on Thursday really just relaxed me and let it come," Beane said. "Again, I did trade up for [WR Khalil] Shakir [in the fifth round] today. But I really like that young man. He's tough, he's smart, he's versatile. And I think with the ball in his hands he's pretty good too. So he was sticking out and I just felt like, you know, `let's go get him. This makes sense.'
"But otherwise, we just kept seeing the board kind of fall and we felt like it truly worked out. ... We chose the guys that we thought made the most sense."
The goal for this draft, according to Beane, was "to handle that corner position and then just [add] some depth. And I think we did that with a couple of linebackers [Terrel Bernard and Spector], another offensive tackle [Luke Tenuta]. We added some competition in the punting room [with Matt Araiza], the receiver room [with Shakir]."
Beane promised the Bills won't force things in the undrafted free-agent marketplace either.
"The job between now and when we show up at St. John Fisher [for training camp in July] is to try and make this team as competitive as possible every single day. So we're not done. We won't be getting our roster to 90 today or tomorrow. There will be more veterans on the street and we'll continue to kind of circulate through the waiver wire at this point."
Bills 2022 NFL Draft picks
Round 1 (23 overall): CB Kaiir Elam, Florida
Round 2 (63): RB James Cook, Georgia
Round 3 (89): LB Terrel Bernard, Baylor
Round 5 (148): WR Khalil Shakir, Boise State
Round 6 (180): P Matt Araiza, San Diego State
Round 6 (185): CB Christian Benford, Villanova
Round 6 (209): OT Luke Tenuta, Virginia Tech
Round 7 (231): LB Baylon Spector, Clemson.
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Nick Fierro is the publisher of Bills Central. Check out the latest Bills news at www.si.com/nfl/bills and follow Fierro on Twitter at @NickFierro. Email to Nicky300@aol.com.
