Orchard Park, N.Y. — Buffalo Bills general manager Brandon Beane admitted on Wednesday that it was hard not to feel like the past few weeks had been a waste of time after his staff chased numerous roads to trades that all led to a dead end the day before.
The Bills made calls for weeks in search of adding talent to a championship-caliber roster that’s been decimated by injuries, mainly on the defensive side of the ball. For several reasons that Beane outlined in a pre-practice press conference, none of the deals came to fruition.
“Believe me, I went home as mad as any other fan,” Beane said. “I wanted to do things. I’m always wanting to do things to make this team better.”
The Bills faced several obstacles on Tuesday as they tried to engineer a trade by the 4 p.m. deadline. The team’s salary cap situation left Beane little room to add a substantial contract. Buffalo restructured cornerback Taron Johnson’s contract to create an additional $1.75 million in space, but there was still only about $3 million total. Beane said there were some other restructures possible, and his team has them ready to go if a trade were finalized, but the players he wanted just weren’t available at the final hour.
“It’s not a store where you can just go in and say, hey, I’ll pay $20 and take this player,” Beane said. “It takes two to be able to do it.”
Beane said he had been talking to teams for weeks and monitoring their progress throughout the season. He said those teams were hesitant to move pieces before knowing where they’d sit around the deadline. Several reports linked the Bills to New Orleans Saints receiver Chris Olave and former Las Vegas Raiders receiver Jakobi Meyers (who was traded to Jacksonville on Tuesday).
“There’s rumors out there that this person is available and that person is available but then they’re not necessarily available and they don’t get moved,” Beane said. “If you guys just ... scroll all the names that were available, and all the names that got traded, the list is this long that were available and the list is this short that actually got moved.”
Beane said he had to take a few higher-priced players off his target list when he wasn’t able to strike a deal with a team by the Monday 4 p.m. deadline. Up until that point, teams can change a player’s contract to eat some of the money to force a trade through. Once that deadline passed, Beane had to focus on players who could fit into the Bills’ tight cap situation.
“I wish the league would fix (it) where ... some leagues allow you to do sign and trade,” he said.
The New York Jets made two monster trades on Tuesday, sending All Pro cornerback Sauce Gardner to the Indianapolis Colts and All Pro defensive tackle Quinnen Williams to the Dallas Cowboys. One insider reported the Bills called the Jets but they were rebuked as a division rival.
Beane all but confirmed that report.
“Unfortunately, it takes two to tango and we tried on quite a few,” he said. “A lot (of what we heard was) we’re not moving them and we ran into a couple teams in our division who were trading, (but we) couldn’t get a lot of interest there.”
A large portion of the fanbase was obviously disheartened by the Bills’ inability to land any players in trades. Many called for Beane to get aggressive, no matter the cost. Beane said any player is available for a price, except maybe a franchise quarterback. But he was reluctant to overpay to acquire a player.
“My job is to not be reckless with this role,” Beane said. “It’s not fantasy football. It’s not. Fantasy football is awesome for what all it brings to our game, but this is not fantasy. There are so many ramifications of cost and draft picks. If you trade for a $25 million player, if you have an extensive knowledge of our cap and where it’s at, not just in ’26, but ’27, ’28, you’re forcing yourself into a really tough position here in a couple years.”
Beane said that doesn’t mean he wouldn’t do a deal, but the consequences were discussed.
“I ain’t giving up, but I also believe in our roster too,” he said. “I do believe we can win a championship with this roster. ... I can not force someone to trade me a player.”
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