OSU Tate.
Ask any Buffalo Bills fan what they want to see their team do to improve this offseason and I guarantee 90 percent of people would say “upgrade at wide receiver.” It’s been the one knock on this Bills team’s Super Bowl window, a lack of an elite outside threat for Josh Allen to throw to.
In a wild trade pitch from CBS Sports’ NFL Draft analyst Ryan Wilson, he thinks Buffalo may make a “Julio Jones-style trade” to move way up the draft board to select Carnell Tate out of Ohio State.
That “Julio Jones-style trade” refers to the 2011 draft, when the Atlanta Falcons traded away their first, second, and fourth round picks in the 2011 draft and first and fourth round picks in the 2012 draft to get Cleveland’s No. 6 overall pick to draft Jones.
It would be a bonkers deal to make, but it actually isn’t that outlandish if you dig a little deeper.
Tate Interested in Playing in Buffalo
First and foremost, that type of trade only occurs when a team absolutely loves a player, enough to warrant moving that much draft capital to get him. Tate is easily the receiver with the highest ceiling in this draft, and according to plenty of people deep in the know in the league, he’d be a plug-and-play potential star in year one.
Tate himself would love to play in Buffalo with Allen.
“I love the idea,” Tate said to Wilson. “Any receiver would love the opportunity to play with a great quarterback who’s competing at the highest level, who’s in … the prime of his career right now and is putting the ball wherever you need it.”
Wilson brings up several other good points: the Bills aren’t in a rebuild, a re-tool, or a restructuring phase. This is a team built to win now with one of, if not the best QB in the NFL, and receivers like Tate don’t just come and go.
Mortgaging the future for one player is a very risky move, but as far as money goes, Buffalo would be saving a ton by not having to pay a free agent. Instead, they’d get Tate on a rookie deal for the next few years while the team is built to win.
And who’s to say that if the Bills kept all those picks that they’d even hit on all or any of them.
Potential Trade Partners for the Bills
Wilson is predicting that the Bills would make the trade to get the Arizona Cardinals No. 3 overall pick. With that being said, the move could come with any team within the top six or seven teams.
It will mostly come down to where the Bills feel Tate would be likely to be taken. It’s a move that will have to happen while another team is on the clock; they can’t make this trade now, because Tate could easily be picked by another team before Buffalo got there.
So, if Wilson’s prediction has any juice to it, the NFL Draft will be must-see TV for Bills fans.