Dozens of Decisions Remain for Bills General Manager Brandon Beane

They will clear enough cap space to be players in free agency, but they have to be cautious spenders in 2022.

While the AFC landscape continued to mutate Thursday following the Los Angeles Chargers' trade for Chicago Bears pass rusher Khalil Mack, the Buffalo Bills responded by doing some maintenance to the bottom of their roster, re-signing key special-teams player Jake Kumerow.

Not exactly front-page material, but the Bills weren't in position to make the kind of splash move for Mack, who has 76.5 sacks in 117 career games and an enormous contract. They were barely under this year's salary cap before keeping Kumerow from leaving.

All that did was reduce the number of their own unrestricted free agents from 15 to 14. They still stand to lose key players like wide receivers Emmanuel Sanders and Isaiah McKenzie, cornerback Levi Wallace, defensive ends Mario Addison and Jerry Hughes, defensive tackle Harrison Phillips, guard Ike Boettger and backup quarterback Mitchell Trubisky.

• RELATED: Bills release Jon Feliciano to get under the salary cap

To get under the cap, they were essentially forced to jettison a pair of high-priced veterans in guard Jon Feliciano and linebacker A.J. Klein, with many more subtractions and/or contract adjustments to come.

Among the questions remaining: How much do they value each player? What is their strategy for keeping the ones they value most? How do they attack the NFL Draft with the nine picks they have going in? Do they give up some to trade up? Do they collect more by moving down? Or do they stand pat?

Given their situation, it's not hard to envision Beane moving out of the first round to gain extra picks, especially because he believes the middle rounds are where most of the best values can be had.

"There's a lot of depth," Beane said last week at the NFL Scouting Combine. I don't know that there's the top guys [of] years past, especially maybe the quarterback position. But I do think there's a lot of depth in this draft. And I think the mid rounds, once you get out of Round 1, you know, 2-3-4, maybe even 5, I think there's going to be some good value."

• RELATED: Bills GM Brandon Beane about to get busy on his roster

That said, Bean is open to moving in either direction. But a lot of that will depend on how they handle business in the new league year, which begins next week.

Negotiations with players whose contracts have expired can begin on Monday. Deals may be completed starting at 4 p.m. EDT on Wednesday.

Look for the Bills to have more transactions than most leading up to the official start period and well beyond. They have to get their payroll in order, and it won't be easy work.

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.