10 Bills Players With the Most to Prove Before Training Camp Opens July 29

The Buffalo Bills open training camp on July 29 at St. John Fisher University, and the roster is loaded with position battles that won’t settle themselves. According to the Buffalo Bills’ official announcement, the team will hold seven open practices in Rochester before heading back to Orchard Park, a shorter camp than a year ago. WHAM13 notes camp is also the first under new head coach Joe Brady and the first tied to the new Highmark Stadium.

Brady made his intentions clear after April’s draft. “We want guys that are going to compete,” he said. “I want to go out to practice in OTAs and training camp, and it’s guys fighting for jobs, and it’s only going to make our team better.”

That competition cuts across the roster. Here are 10 Bills players who’ll be watched closest once pads go on, per Buffalo Bills On SI.

The Offensive Line Battles

Left guard is wide open after David Edwards left in free agency, and three players are circling it. Alec Anderson enters as the presumed favorite. The 6-foot-5 lineman made spot starts at right tackle and left guard last season, and his familiarity with Buffalo’s system gives him a head start. He’ll have to hold off Austin Corbett, a prove-it signing who started every game at right guard for the Super Bowl LVI champion Rams and was Carolina’s center a season ago. Corbett is 30 and coming off multiple injury-slowed years, but his résumé is real.

Behind them, Lloyd Cushenberry arrives as center insurance after six years starting for Tennessee. With Connor McGovern re-signed at center, Cushenberry’s path to a roster spot likely runs through beating out 2025 fifth-round pick Sedrick Van Pran-Granger for a backup job — a tougher sell since he hasn’t shown guard flexibility in the NFL.

Skill Position Question Marks

No player carries more offseason baggage than Keon Coleman. The former No. 33 overall pick opened 2025 with a 112-yard game, then averaged just 24.3 yards per game the rest of the way while dealing with what the team has described as professionalism concerns. Bills brass has publicly kept him in the plans, but a fresh start under Brady doesn’t erase the tape. He’ll be pushed by fourth-round rookie Skyler Bell and by Joshua Palmer, whose own 2025 was a write-off — 22 catches on 393 snaps across 12 games after a Week 6 ankle and knee injury wrecked his first season on a three-year, $29 million deal. With DJ Moore now in the fold and Khalil Shakir entrenched, Palmer and Coleman are effectively fighting each other for what’s left.

Defensive Development Under a New Scheme

Cornerback Maxwell Hairston’s rookie year barely happened. A knee injury delayed his 2025 debut to Week 8, and what followed was, by the team’s own accounting, a mixed bag. He’s currently the presumed CB2 opposite Christian Benford, but new defensive coordinator Jim Leonhard is installing a different scheme, and second-round pick Davison Igbinosun — a player Buffalo traded up to get in April — is real competition, not camp filler.

Safety Cole Bishop is dealing with a similar reset. He flashed real ability in 2025 but is coming off an offseason knee procedure and now has to learn Leonhard’s defense while fending off veterans Chauncey Gardner-Johnson, Geno Stone and Damar Hamlin, all of whom have starting experience. At linebacker, Dorian Williams gets his first real shot at a starting job after three years behind Terrel Bernard and Matt Milano, who remains unsigned. Williams still has to recover from a recent injury, and fourth-round rookie Kaleb Elarms-Orr already turned heads during OTAs.

Special Teams Has Its Own Drama

Kicker Tyler Bass is the lone kicker on Buffalo’s 90-man roster, but that doesn’t make his job safe from doubt. He missed the entirety of the 2025 season recovering from a core muscle injury and subsequent surgery, after struggling with accuracy for much of 2024 before making all 13 of his playoff attempts. Camp is where he proves the leg is back. At punter, seventh-round rookie Tommy Doman will push incumbent Mitch Wishnowsky, who filled in reliably after taking over last October. Doman’s above-average hang time at Michigan and Florida gives him a real shot, but as a Day 3 pick, he’s squarely on the roster bubble.

Why This Camp Matters

What ties these battles together is turnover at the top. A new head coach and a new defensive coordinator mean scheme fit counts as much as raw talent this summer — players who were safe bets under the old staff, like Hairston or Bishop, now have to prove they fit what Leonhard wants to run. Combine that with real financial and roster pressure at receiver, guard and specialist spots, and camp becomes less about evaluation and more about survival for several of these names.

None of it gets settled until pads come on July 29. St. John Fisher University hosts the Bills for the 25th time in 27 seasons, and for at least ten players on this roster, the next few weeks decide whether they’re part of Buffalo’s plans past September.