{"id":307906,"date":"2025-08-22T06:43:11","date_gmt":"2025-08-22T06:43:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/307906\/"},"modified":"2025-08-22T06:43:11","modified_gmt":"2025-08-22T06:43:11","slug":"curtis-samuel-on-bills-roster-bubble-mitch-trubisky-leading-qb2-battle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/307906\/","title":{"rendered":"Curtis Samuel On Bills’ Roster Bubble; Mitch Trubisky Leading QB2 Battle"},"content":{"rendered":"

A host of experienced players accompany Keon Coleman<\/a> in the Bills\u2019 wide receiver room. Joshua Palmer is a roster lock, and Elijah Moore<\/a> \u2014 who has seen plenty of work in place of an injured Khalil Shakir<\/a> this month \u2014 has been viewed as fairly safe. One other veteran does not appear to be on steady ground.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Once Shakir recovers from the high ankle sprain he suffered earlier this month<\/a>, the recently extended receiver will reprise his role as Buffalo\u2019s top slot option. Coleman and Palmer will join him as regulars, leaving questions about how the Bills round out their room. One player needing to make a late push appears to be Curtis Samuel<\/a>, who has two seasons remaining on a three-year, $24MM deal<\/a>. Further complicating the situation: Samuel\u2019s 2025 base salary ($6.91MM) is guaranteed.<\/p>\n

[RELATED: Assessing Bills\u2019 Extension-Filled Offseason]<\/a><\/p>\n

But the Bills are not certain to keep the former second-round pick, The Athletic\u2019s Joe Buscaglia notes<\/a>. Samuel battled back from a hamstring injury to log a full practice for the first time this week, per Buscaglia, who adds the eighth-year veteran\u2019s lack of involvement on special teams complicates his path to a second Bills roster.<\/p>\n

Buffalo has Laviska Shenault<\/a> in place as a return option, with third-year UDFA Tyrell Shavers<\/a> and low-cost free agency addition Kristian Wilkerson<\/a> also in the mix for back-end roster spots. Shavers (three career games played) is among those who impressed in Samuel\u2019s absence, Buscaglia adds.<\/p>\n

Samuel, 29, did not impress much in his first Bills season; he caught 31 passes for 253 yards and one touchdown before adding two more TDs in the playoffs. Ex-Panthers old enough to have been in Charlotte under Brandon Beane and\/or Sean McDermott have been popular commodities in Buffalo, as the Shaq Thompson<\/a> addition reinforces, but Samuel\u2019s guarantee is not locking him into another Bills plan just yet (the Panthers drafted Samuel during Beane\u2019s final draft with the team; Samuel also overlapped with OC Joe Brady in Carolina).<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>If Buffalo were to cut Samuel, a lofty dead money hit ($8.64MM) would await this year. Another $3MM-plus would be part of Buffalo\u2019s 2026 payroll, per OverTheCap, due to the post-June 1 timing of a release. Samuel also looms as a potential trade candidate, Buscaglia adds<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Considering the ex-Panthers and Commanders slot weapon\u2019s inconsistency, the Bills would undoubtedly need to pay some of his base salary to facilitate a swap. Teams are looking, however, as the Jets and Vikings \u2014 and perhaps still the 49ers, even after their Skyy Moore<\/a> acquisition \u2014 are among those on the hunt at receiver<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Shifting to the battle to back up Josh Allen<\/a>, Buscaglia notes Mitch Trubisky<\/a> holds a lead on Mike White<\/a>. Outplaying White in the joint practice with the Bears, Trubisky winning the job would merely mean holding off a player who spent last season on Buffalo\u2019s practice squad. But the Bills did extend White via his reserve\/futures deal, giving the ex-Jets starter a chance to vie for the QB2 gig<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Neither Trubisky nor White impressed much in the Bears\u2019 38-0 win over the Bills last week, and determining a backup has not been a Bills issue \u2014 due to an Allen games-played streak that stretches back to his rookie year \u2014 in a while. But the former No. 2 overall pick, who is heading into his age-31 season, may be moving closer to hanging onto the job he held in 2024 (and before that in 2021). Trubisky has a $1MM salary guarantee and is tied to a $3.25MM cap number; White is at just $1.2MM on Buffalo\u2019s cap.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A host of experienced players accompany Keon Coleman in the Bills\u2019 wide receiver room. Joshua Palmer is a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":307907,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2048],"tags":[215,214,53,2086,306,7,19376,12568,6,37369],"class_list":{"0":"post-307906","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-buffalo-bills","8":"tag-bills","9":"tag-buffalo","10":"tag-buffalo-bills","11":"tag-buffalobills","12":"tag-curtis-samuel","13":"tag-football","14":"tag-mike-white","15":"tag-mitchell-trubisky","16":"tag-nfl","17":"tag-tyrell-shavers"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/115071064804231232","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307906","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=307906"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307906\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/307907"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=307906"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=307906"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=307906"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}