At the second Buffalo Bills Training Camp night practice, head coach Chan Gailey stated he saw “some progress” being made at camp as the team’s first preseason game approaches. Bills fans might be slightly anxious due to this comment by Gailey because many feel as though the Bills need to make an immense amount of progress this offseason in order to be playoff contenders. The Bills take on the Washington Redskins next Thursday August 9th at Ralph Wilson Stadium and although it is just a preseason game, we will all get a sneak peek at this newly remodeled Bills team.
Wednesday’s night practice was rather uneventful, with a scarce amount of big plays being made by the Bills. There were accuracy problems with back-up quarterbacks Tyler Thigpen and Vince Young. Gailey addressed this issue in the press conference following practice stating, “Tyler and Vince both are having some trouble there. The twos in general are not performing very well offensively.” This is a rather big concern for the team seeing as consistency at the quarterback position has been an enormous problem for the Bills offense in the past couple of years.
Another issue the Bills are currently facing is the growing number of players suffering injuries at training camp. Wide receiver David Nelson is still not participating in practice due to a bruised right knee. Linebacker Kelvin Sheppard also sat out of night practice with an “undisclosed” medical issue and Justin Rogers, Josh Nesbitt, Kamar Aiken, Kellen Heard, and Mike Caussin all joined Sheppard and Nelson on the sidelines due to various injuries. The Bills also waived running back Chris Douglas on Thursday due to injury.
The Buffalo Bills still have a lot of work to do in order to get to the level they want to be playing at to start the regular season; however, the fans and the players seem to be enjoying training camp and having a great time interacting with each other. The Bills need to work on consistency and avoid injuries so they can go into the season healthy. They were plagued by consistency and injury problems which sank them last season, even though they showed flashes of playoff-caliber football, especially in their 5-2 start last season. For now, the Bills will continue to focus on incremental improvement, and we’ll have to stay tuned as the season gets closer.
Bills fans should also note that the annual Kids Day at Buffalo Bills Training Camp is this Saturday August 4th and it goes from 2:00-6:00 PM.
