The Buffalo Bills wrapped up mandatory minicamp last Thursday and now have nearly 50 days before the start of training camp. This is the time of year where guys get away to recharge before the season or in some cases, take the extra time to heal in order to hit the ground running.
Over the last few months, we have learned a ton about the various surgeries, new injuries, and potential concerns that could impact the 2026 season.
Read below for all the latest injury updates coming out of minicamp.
New Injuries
LB Dorian Williams (Lower Body)
Williams did not participate during any portion of Phase 3 OTAs for initially unknown reasons. He showed up to Tuesday’s minicamp practice on crutches with head coach Joe Brady not revealing much about the nature of the injury and did not reveal whether he underwent surgery.
He was seen on crutches walking around on Tuesday but after speaking with the Niagara Gazette’s Nick Sabato, he states that Williams was off the crutches which is a good sign. Looking at social media, we can at least narrow down when this injury may have occurred. He was present as recently as May 13 when he was lifting during Phase 2 OTAs and didn’t appear to have any limitations.
Furthermore, Williams had been training down in South Carolina with Shaq Thompson earlier this offseason and was tagged in a local PT he was working with doing thoracic stretching posted on May 15.
It’s entirely possible that this video was made prior to May 15 but my assumption is that this was around that time. Working with that date, that gives Williams nearly 10 weeks to be fully healthy for training camp. Without knowing more about what he is dealing with, that remains to be seen.
WR Skyler Bell (Left Leg)
Bell was potentially the biggest injury coming out of minicamp when he was spotted with a compression sleeve on his left leg. Looking at the picture, the presentation gives us several clues. The sleeve ends mid-calf which suggests that the issue is up higher, such as knee, hamstring, or quad. The other clue is when he is adjusting or tying his shoe, he has his foot on the water cooler with the knee bent significantly. Had he sprained his knee, I don’t think putting his knee in that position if it’s painful or swollen would have felt good.
Based on that, my assumption is that this is a hamstring or quadriceps issue. He had a significant hamstring strain in 2021 when he was at Wisconsin that cost him nearly the entire season. It’s possible this is another minor tweak that happened late last week and the team was being cautious.
The other possibility is that this is a quadriceps issue. Bell did miss the Shrine Bowl due to a quadriceps injury but it’s not clear what side the injury was on. This could have been an aggravation of that prior issue but without more information, we are left guessing. He should have ample time to be ready for camp but this will be one to watch in case he comes out of the gate slow.
Injury Updates
OL Spencer Brown (Left Leg)
Brown missed all of Phase 3 OTAs with a left leg issue as evident by a compression sleeve seen during his football camp in Iowa.
My assumption based on how they use those sleeves is that he is dealing with a lower extremity strain which the team is being conservative with. He has previously missed parts of OTAs and training camp in past years but when it’s game time, he shows up ready to go. I don’t have any concerns about his availability come July.
S Cole Bishop (Left Knee)
Bishop quietly missed all of Phase 3 OTAs after he was not present or did not participate. Initially, I did not think anything of it as other players did not show up but Bishop later revealed that he underwent a left knee scope at some point during the offseason.
Looking as to when it could have occurred, it may have been sometime after May 6. Even a basic knee scope would have kept Bishop out of the weight room for a short period of time. He was also out on the field on June 2 but didn’t practice which gives a three week window when this surgery could have occurred. The scope was likely to remove some loose cartilage or any potential fraying of the meniscus that was acting as an irritant causing soreness and pain.
He was never on the injury report for a knee last year but did miss a portion of training camp due to a left quad issue. Whether the knee was also involved isn’t clear or it’s possible that this was something that occurred during the season and just simply wasn’t significant enough to be on the injury report.
Either way, Bishop himself said that he should be ready for camp and that if he isn’t, then something has gone wrong. I have zero concern for his ability to be ready.
WR Tyrell Shavers (Left ACL Tear)
Shavers continues to work his way back from his January ACL tear with resulting surgery. He has been putting the work in and biding his time while he works his way back into football shape. His legs look symmetrical in the post indicating equal muscle mass below but that only tells us so much.
I wouldn’t expect him to return until late in the season, roughly December if he has an outstanding recovery and even then he may be limited in his true abilities.
OL Lloyd Cushenberry (Shoulder)
Cushenberry was present during all practices this offseason but was wearing a red non-contact jersey during Phase 3 OTAs. This was due to shoulder surgery that led to his release from the Tennessee Titans with a failed physical designation.
It’s not clear which side or what procedure he underwent, but he appears on track to play this season. Without more details, it’s hard to determine if he would be limited for training camp or be placed on PUP as he recovers. This is a wait and see approach, but I’m leading towards he will be ready come late July.
S Jordan Hancock (Right Shoulder)
Hancock has continued to participate throughout all of OTAs and camp wearing a red non-contact jersey due to offseason shoulder surgery.
He was not on the injury report during the season due to a shoulder injury but did have a preseason injury against the Chicago Bears. He said at the time it was a stinger but it’s possible that this was more and either he wasn’t aware of the damage or downplayed it and just gutted it out. He is in a similar boat to that of Cushenberry but he appears on track to be ready for camp.
FB Jackson Acker (Left Leg)
Acker has been a mystery, not participating during portions of the OTAs and then wearing a compression sleeve on his left leg on the first day of minicamp. It’s not clear when he suffered the injury but he was healthy enough to participate on Tuesday before sitting out Wednesday and Thursday, suggesting that he aggravated the issue.
There should be ample time to rehab and recover for camp but this is one to watch as he has one of the best chances as a UDFA to make the roster.
WR Joshua Palmer (Left Ankle/Calf/Hip)
Palmer finally returned to the field in full 11-on-11’s during minicamp as he appeared to finish his rehab. Prior to this, he had been rehabbing from his injury sustained in Week 6 last year where he suffered his high-ankle sprain along with injuries to his hip, calf, and likely knee.
He has acknowledged that this was one of the most difficult experiences in his career but confirmed he did not undergo surgery. It’s well known at this point how high-ankle sprains can linger and it likely did for Palmer, but we still don’t quite know what led to his extended rehab, whether it was the ankle or other structures.
He has been the recipient of more unfortunate injuries rather than frequent injuries or returning too soon. Let’s hope his luck improves in 2026.
DE Michael Hoecht (Right Achilles)
By all accounts, Michael Hoecht should be ready to go for training camp after tearing his right Achilles on November 2. Even dating back to earlier this offseason in February, Hoecht had stated his goal was to be ready for July 1.
Hoecht had been making steady progress throughout May when we got plenty of updates with regards to how he ran, cut, jumped, and everything else that went into the later stages of rehab. Furthermore, Brandon Beane said Hoecht will be ready for camp but may need half days or limit his workload early on to not overdo it. His risk to re-tear is low as most tears happen earlier in the rehab process within the first three months which Hoecht is well removed from at this point.
Despite Hoecht being ready to play, a return to performance will take much longer. We may still see some compensation injuries such as a hamstring or groin strain or needing veteran rest days. He simply won’t have the same explosion off that right side for a while and may show some fatigue later in games. As the season progresses, the reps will compound and he’ll improve, but we won’t see a pre-injury form Hoecht until 2027 but we may get some flashes during the later half of the season. Barring a setback, Hoecht should be ready for camp based on what we see above.
Injured Reserve
The Bills made a series of roster transactions following the final day of minicamp including signing WR Max Tomczak, signing WR Deven Thompkins after a tryout, releasing WR Gabriel Benyard, waiving RB Desmond Reid with an injury designation. We don’t know what the specific injury for Reid was but if he receives an injury settlement, this will allow him to find another team once healthy. Otherwise, he would revert to injured reserve for the season.
DB Dorian Strong (Neck)
The most notable transaction was waiving Dorian Strong on the non-football injury list before he reverted to reserve/NFI list Friday. This move was largely expected as he was still rehabbing throughout the offseason after February neck surgery. Placing him on injured reserve now ends his 2026 season but allows him to continue to rehab and collect his pay while on injured reserve.
The one thing that has me hung up is the use of non-football injury designation. This designation is typically for injuries suffered away from football. This could be injuries outside of the facility or while privately training. Think of when Nyhiem Hines tore his ACL on a jetski or when Najee Harris injured his eye with fireworks last season. This allows the team to count against the 90 man roster but not let them practice. This also allows a team to not pay a player as this was due to injuries sustained outside of NFL football. However, we see instances where players negotiate some sort of payout such as Nyhiem Hines.
What I don’t understand but potentially found an answer to is why the use of NFI versus PUP or physically unable to perform. NFI says you have an issue not caused by football while PUP was due to football.
We know that Strong suffered the neck injury sometime either in the New Orleans game in Week 4 or in practice. He wasn’t on the injury report until that Thursday with Sean McDermott stating that they weren’t sure whether it was during practice or the game.
The NFI designation was clarified by WGR 550’s Sal Cappacio who stated on YouTube that this is a non-football injury because it happened last year. I respect Sal and he’s one of the most knowledgeable and connected beat reporters in this market.
The only confusion I have is why wasn’t this done in a similar situation with Tommy Doyle when he suffered his ACL tear in 2023 that resulted in nerve damage, ending his football career. At the time, Doyle was placed on PUP and spent the 2024 season there before he retired the following spring. This was the same situation and this was part of Article 45 of the NFL CBA that protected patients financially in case of serious injury.
The only difference between Strong and Doyle would be where they were at in their respective careers. Doyle was drafted in the 2021 season and played all of 2021, a portion of 2022 until injury, and missed 2023 and 2024 due to injury. Looking at benefits, there is a difference between accrued seasons and credited seasons. Accrued seasons count towards free agency and becoming a vested veteran while credited seasons count towards benefits.
Doyle was further along in his career and the designations were likely made to allow him to get enough credited seasons to qualify for a pension and medical benefits after he retired.
In Strong’s case, he was injured his rookie year which he’ll get one credited season but after that, it is murky towards his eligibility for benefits and pay moving forward.
There are several financial levers the Bills can utilize to help mitigate the salary cap issues that come with placing a player on injured reserve. The first is a split contract. What this basically states is that the player will be paid a certain amount if he is active during the week during the season. If he is inactive or on injured reserve, that amount is lowered per the split. This prevents paying a player their full amount if they’re not contributing. This is often done for lower drafted players, UDFA’s, and veterans with injury histories.
Strong likely had a split contract which means his base salary of $540,000 for this season would have been more like $270,000 towards the cap if he was on injured reserve. That heavily benefits the Bills bottom line and hurts Strong’s wallet.
There is also another lever that benefits both parties called the Injury Protection Benefit. This allows a player if they qualify to be financially compensated due to severe injury sustained while playing. All screenshots are from the NFL CBA.
Looking at the benefits qualification above, Strong would easily qualify which means that he gets a 100 percent match of his Paragraph 5 base salary for 2026 instead of settling for the previously mentioned split salary if he was on injured reserve. This means that Strong would receive $1.08 million for the 2026 season, $540,000 base salary + the 100% match. Upwards of $1.2 million count towards the salary cap and then anything remaining is a player benefit cost. A player can only receive an Injury Protection Benefit once in their NFL career. There is one final provision that a player can access that is an Extended Injury Protection Benefit. This is a similar structure and basically goes through a second season afterward and can only be used once as well. Strong would be set to make $1.12 million in 2027 and the first $575,000 would be charged to the team salary cap with the remaining going to Player Benefit Costs.
In each of those instances, those are the payouts unless there is an individually negotiated contract that exceeds the Extended Injury Protection guarantee. Where this ties back together is the NFI designation. There was an article from Andrew Brandt, former agent and Green Bay Packers executive that discussed NFL contracts in 2017 for Sports Illustrated. He discussed how some agents negotiated NFI designations which allow a team to either pay zero to full salary. It’s entirely possible that Strong had a split contract, knowing his career may be over due to the injury, and instead of stretching this process out two years, he gets the NFI designation to be paid out accordingly with a possibility to remove any contract obligations from future salary caps.
Basically, Strong gets a financial payout and the Bills get his contract off the books faster. This is the only workaround I can find based on the language of the CBA and the article from Andrew Brandt.
The only other scenario was that Strong had a pre-existing injury the public was unaware of in his neck, he injured it further in the game, and then the Bills proved that the latest injury was the result of a non-football injury. There have been two instances I found previously that showed this with Tyus Bowser of the Baltimore Ravens and Lawrence Tynes of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Both had injuries in football but the team found a way to apply NFI due to complications from their respective injuries.
So to sum it up, two things could happen here. Strong had a pre-existing injury the public was not aware of, the Bills have proof that this was a pre-existing injury such as spinal stenosis and it is technically a non-football injury, hence the designation. Once his contract is terminated due to injury, he then has two credited seasons and allows him to begin accessing benefits to non-vested players including Line of Duty Disability and Severance Payment.
Other possibility is that his contract was re-negotiated for financials should his career be over from what the CBA and what Andrew Brandt stated. At that point then he can access the above mentioned benefits.
There is a reason why NFI is used versus PUP and I did my best to explain the reasoning in this instance. If there is a better explanation or my reasoning is flawed, I would love to have a discussion to learn more and clarify the reasoning.
Final Thoughts
Barring surprise news or offseason injuries, we won’t get any updates until training camp in late July. There are always injury storylines every year heading into training camp. With a new coach, we may see a change in how training camp operates and could see players exposed to different workloads to reduce or manage injuries.
We will still see the league mandated ramp up time to avoid overexertion in an attempt to reduce injuries, but the main goal for the Bills will be to keep players on the field this year. The last few years saw key contributors miss a lot of time which stressed the depth significantly early and often. The players need to harden their bodies, but we may see a different approach this year.
Be sure to check back for the latest injuries and updates throughout this offseason.
Top Photo Credit: AP Photo/Seth Wenig
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