ORCHARD PARK – You can make the case that the Buffalo Bills could just as easily be 1-2 instead of 3-0 to start the 2025 NFL season.
But that case would fall on deaf ears because the Bills rallied in near miraculous fashion to beat the Ravens in Week 1, they took care of business against an inferior Jets team in Week 2, and then after allowing another inferior team, the Dolphins, to hang around for way too long Thursday night, the Bills eventually put Miami out of its misery in a 31-21 victory.
Now the Bills get to take a few hard-earned days off this weekend during the mini-bye teams get when they play the dreaded Thursday game, and if the Pittsburgh Steelers can go up to New England and beat the Patriots, the Bills would be at least two games ahead of all three AFC East rivals after just a few days after the official end of summer.
Here are a few players whose performance I have liked through the first three games:
RB James Cook
He is a full-fledged star in his fourth NFL season and the Bills are realizing his importance because he has been on the field for 56% of the snaps which is a big rise over his first three seasons, and that percentage would be higher if the Bills hadn’t blown out the Jets and sat him the entire fourth quarter. Cook played 66.7% percent of the snaps Thursday, the third-highest figure of his career and for the season he is averaging 5.7 yards per touch.
TE Jackson Hawes
The rookie has a reception in each game including a clutch 29-yarder against Baltimore and then a five-yard TD against Miami. The Bills are really leaning into heavy personnel, doing so almost 35% of the time so far and Hawes is a big part of that because he is such a tremendous blocker. He has played 35% of the snaps and has made the 2024 use of sixth offensive lineman Alec Anderson a moot point.
LB Terrel Bernard
He can be a bit of a mixed bag because there are times when he can get caught out of position or, because he weighs just 225 pounds, he gets washed away against the run. But there is no player on the Bills defense who makes more game-changing plays than Bernard. He made another one against Miami with his interception, and he also recovered Derrick Henry’s fumble in Week 1 which was the key to pulling off that comeback. Both of those takeaways came with around three minutes to go and the games hanging in the balance.
CB Tre’Davious White
I’ll admit I wasn’t all that confident the former All-Pro had anything left after two serious injuries in 2021 and 2023 with Buffalo, a mostly lost in the wilderness 2024 playing for the Rams and Ravens, and then a late-camp groin injury that knocked him out of the opener. But White was very good against Miami. He gave up five receptions on six targets, but they went for just 27 yards, and he was strong in the run game which has never been his calling card. If he keeps playing like that, the Bills can slow-play first-round pick Maxwell Hairston’s return from a knee injury as long as they want.
DT Deone Walker
Of the three defensive linemen the Bills picked in the 2025 draft, fourth-rounder Walker has clearly been the most impressive. Third-round edge rusher Landon Jackson has been inactive all three games and second-rounder TJ Sanders has been a bit invisible, but Walker has made plays in every game. Against Miami he had two tackles and it was his quick pressure that affected Tua Tagovailoa’s pass that Bernard picked off.
K Matt Prater
Yes, he had an awful miss from 39 yards against Miami, but he also made all four extra points and drilled the clinching 48-yard field goal. The 41-year-old came out of retirement just before the season began to replace injured Tyler Bass and he made the walk-off field goal to beat the Ravens and has converted 7 of 8 field goals and all nine extra points. And he has also done a nice job placing his kickoffs in the landing area.
Here are a few players I’ve been underwhelmed by so far:
DE Greg Rousseau
The Bills gave their 2021 first-round pick a rich contract extension, part of a trend for Brandon Beane during the offseason, but he has done very little to warrant that pay raise. He has just eight QB pressures and a half sack in the three games and his pressure rate of 12.5% trails both Joey Bosa and AJ Epenesa while his time to pressure of 4.24 seconds is only sixth-best on the team. Granted, elusive Lamar Jackson and quick-trigger Tua Tagovailoa are tough to sack, but Rousseau needs to provide more.
RB Ray Davis
The second-year backup to Cook looks slow and tentative in his limited workload. He has played just 16% of the snaps (he played 24% as a rookie) and he’s averaging only 2.6 yards on his 10 rushing attempts while his lone pass reception lost a yard. He now seems to be losing No. 2 RB snaps to Ty Johnson.
WR Joshua Palmer
The free agent signee made a big 32-yard catch against the Ravens, then another 32-yarder against the Jets, but in the Miami victory he was targeted once and caught that pass for five yards. Palmer’s three-game total of eight catches on 13 targets for 113 yards has been disappointing. Of course, it’s far better than Curtis Samuel who hasn’t even dressed for a game and has become one of the worst free agent signings of Beane’s tenure in Buffalo.
CB Christian Benford
He entered the season considered the Bills far-and-away top cover man and a rising star in the NFL, but he’s had a rather uneven start. He has allowed a reception into his primary coverage area on 11 of 17 targets for 131 yards and three TDs. There was a school of thought that teams would not bother testing Benford because there were other weak spots in the defense to attack, but that hasn’t been the case as the next-most targeted player is nickel CB Taron Johnson with nine.
RT Spencer Brown
He hasn’t looked fully healthy as he may still be dealing with his cranky back that slowed him early in his career and caused him to miss a bunch of time in training camp. He’s still a road grader in the run game and PFF grades him as the best on the line, but he has allowed a team-worst nine QB pressures which have forced Allen to get off his spot in the pocket.
Brad Robbins and Cameron Johnston
Robbins began the season as Buffalo’s punter and he lasted one game before Sean McDermott cut him and the team signed Johnston. But Johnston hasn’t been much better and in the Miami game his 36.5 net average was pretty lame, and counting the Jets game it is now 38.4 which ranks 25th among 32 qualified punters.
Sal Maiorana has covered the Buffalo Bills for four decades including 35 years as the full-time beat writer for the D&C, he has written numerous books about the history of the team, and he is also co-host of the BLEAV in Bills podcast/YouTube show. He can be reached at maiorana@gannett.com, and you can follow him on X @salmaiorana and on Bluesky @salmaiorana.bsky.social.
This article originally appeared on Rochester Democrat and Chronicle: After the 3-0 start, here are the Bills who have impressed and those who have not
Reporting by Sal Maiorana, Rochester Democrat and Chronicle / Rochester Democrat and Chronicle
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
