Mock mocking or mock marveling: ESPN’s Field Yates and Mel Kiper address Bills’ needs in latest mock

Opinion oscillation

The 2024 NFL Draft kicks off in less than two weeks. We’re in peak lying season. Many draft analysts have found that their most accurate mock drafts are those that occur right after the NFL Scouting Combine in February — and aren’t adjusted at all after that specifically because it can be so hard to parse out the correct information in a sea of positioning and bluffing done by NFL teams during this time.

Former Buffalo Bills general manager Buddy Nix even admitted to “put(ting) it out there” that former Buffalo left tackle draft selection Cordy Glenn was a guard in the hopes that it would diminish his draft stock and allow the Bills a better chance of securing the services of the former Georgia Bulldog.

Bills fans understand that mock drafts are thought exercises. Very rarely are they intended to be intently predictive before the week of the actual NFL Draft is upon us, and mock drafts before free agency are especially volatile. They are intended to generate not just clicks, but also individual reactions to a multitude of different possibilities.

Mock drafts are also much better when they’re multiple rounds. These can eliminate the temptation to hyperfixate on only the first-round selection for your team and allow the reader to view the draft class in not necessarily its entirety (unless the mock draft is 257 picks), but in a broader view.

That makes mock drafts like the one we’ll use today of more value than previous ones because there are three rounds being mocked, including trades. That opens up the “in this circumstance, the Bills could have theoretically traded up or back and didn’t” aspect of the draft.

Mel Kiper and Field Yates from ESPN published a mock draft on Monday, April 15 — and this draft featured not one, but two Bills picks; one at 28 overall and one at 60 overall:

28. Buffalo Bills

Yates’ pick: Adonai Mitchell, WR, Texas

I’ve got Buffalo earmarked as a team that could trade up. But in this scenario, the Bills can stick at No. 28 and still land the speedy Mitchell — who ran a 4.34-second 40-yard dash at the combine and had just one drop in 2023.

60. Buffalo Bills

Yates’ pick: Cole Bishop, S, Utah

The Bills have a few clear needs entering the draft, and after getting a wide receiver on Day 1 here, it’s time to turn to safety. My No. 1-ranked player at the position, Bishop offers versatility, high-end man-coverage traits and speed.

This article series is titled “mock mocking or mock marveling” for a reason. It’s about the gut and initial reaction that I have to the player being selected for the Bills in the selected mock draft — and in this case, the coin lands on “marveling”… just slightly.

I do this article series every year, and recently I wrote one that included only the first round and had Texas wide receiver Adonai Mitchell as the pick at 28 — and I labeled my response as “mocking.” Here was my summation:

Adonai Mitchell is one of the most polarizing receiving prospects in this year’s draft. If the Bills select him, the amount of homework they did into his perceived weaknesses may be key to unlocking his potential as a top target for their offense. For me personally, if I heard that name fall from Roger Goodell’s mouth at pick 28, I’d be excited about the potential. But I’d be more nervous, and that’s where my stance originates.

I mentioned above that one of the benefits to a multi-round mock draft is it allows for a broader view than just one pick in one round, and this is an example of that.

I like Cole Bishop as a safety prospect, and that’s enough to tip my overall opinion the other direction.

The Bills’ current safety room consists of Mike Edwards, Kendall Williamson, Taylor Rapp, and Damar Hamlin. Cam Lewis can also be counted in that room unless you view him primarily as a backup nickel defender.

Buffalo’s need at safety is less discussed than it otherwise would be for two reasons: first, the need at wide receiver even before the Stefon Diggs trade has enveloped much of the public discussion and secondly, there aren’t multiple surefire first-round safety prospects in the 2024 class that seem like obvious picks when most mock drafts are (as mentioned above) only one round.

Bishop is a freak athlete and an elite competitor. He shares an alma mater with Bills 2023 first-round pick Dalton Kincaid and has great size for the position. He can be overaggressive in coverage at times and makes bigger plays the closer he is to the line of scrimmage, but doesn’t project as a “box only” safety whose value is significantly diminished in a pass-first league.

With the amount of split safety looks the Bills employ in Cover 2 and Cover 4, he won’t be asked frequently to play single-high and maintain hip flexibility in both directions as the lone deep defender while making plays on the ball in front of him. The Bills have had recent success with taller and more aggressive defenders when they traded for Green Bay Packers cornerback Rasul Douglas in the middle of the 2023 season.

Bishop is a much better athlete than Douglas, but continues the trend of adding size and length to the defense in the attempt to create explosive defensive plays to halt offensive progress.

…and that’s the way the cookie crumbles. I’m Bruce Nolan with Buffalo Rumblings. You can find me on Twitter and Instagram @BruceExclusive.