Buffalo, N.Y. (WGR 550) - Well, that escalated quickly!
When Stefon Diggs was traded Wednesday morning, it felt like my moment to shine at work. Everyone in the office looked at me, my phone started blowing up, and I’d spend the next several hours talking about the "why" of the move, what general manager Brandon Beane could possibly be thinking, and what the plan was.
Truth be told, I was as shocked as everyone else. Sure, there had been rumors and rumblings of a trade dating back to last March, but the finality of it all felt so surreal.
I refreshed X feed three times, thinking I was being punk’d by some fake Adam Schefter account, but every time I hit refresh, more NFL reporters had the scoop.
It felt like one of those moments you’d look back in 10 years and say, "I remember exactly where I was when the Bills traded away Stefon Diggs."
I remember where I was when the Bills traded Kiko Alonso for LeSean McCoy. I was sitting in Bruce Bryski’s lecture at SUNY Buffalo State, sneaking a quick peek at Twitter (sorry, Bruce) and seeing the trade had happened. I couldn’t contain my excitement, and started looking around the room just hoping someone was as excited as me. No dice.
This time, I wasn’t alone. Friends, family, and co-workers all marveled at what had just happened. It was real, and now it was time to figure out what this all means.
I’m here to try to make sense of just that:
What this means for the "now":
Beane met with the media shortly after the 4 o’clock hour on Wednesday, roughly five hours after news of the trade broke on social media. Although the entirety of the press conference didn’t reveal any details about exactly why this move was made, Beane did acknowledge this move didn’t exactly make the Bills better today.
Beane then pointed several times to the fact that we have a long way to go until games started in September. While true, the timing of all this seems a little off.
They did address some depth issues at receiver with the signing of Curtis Samuel, but with the hole now left by Diggs and the very limited supply of notable names in free agency, it feels like the Bills could have set themselves up better by making this move sooner.
It's very likely the Bills will now rely on one or several rookie receivers to fill the massive hole left behind by Diggs, considering the remaining names in free agency won’t move the needle much in the short or certainly the long term.
Finally, the financial implications for this season are devastating. The trade adds an additional $3 million to an already tight salary cap situation, and leaves the Bills on the hook with $31 million in dead cap.
For a team that views itself as a "contender", trading their best receiver while he counts against your cap at that sort of significance is quite telling.
Without directly saying it, when Beane declined to comment on whether Diggs and his agent had requested a trade, he all but confirmed that’s where we are.
Diggs likely saw all of the offseason moves to get cap-compliant and viewed the Bills as a team taking a step back. Whether or not that was true, a move like this certainly feels like an organization realizing the roster it had built for a Super Bowl no longer gave them the best chance to do just that.
Related
What this means for the future:
That leaves us with the future, and boy does that seem murky as of now.
I just pointed out the immediate financial impacts and how prohibitive this move is for the Bills, in terms of the 2024 outlook, but the Bills effectively opened $27.3 million in cap space for the 2025 season.
Assuming the Bills tab their first-round pick later this month as a lottery ticket, the Bills will have, effectively, turned over their entire wide receiver room from two seasons ago.
This isn’t a new strategy for the Bills since Josh Allen has been behind center. The move from big catch-point receivers Allen’s rookie year to smaller, speedy route runners like John Brown and Cole Beasley the following season is a perfect example of that. They added Diggs to that, duo and Allen had his best season in 2020.
Now with 27-year-old Curtis Samuel and third-year pro Khalil Shakir as the current "core", it’s obvious this Joe Brady offense is prioritizing separators and yards-after-catch guys.
There will be plenty of those guys available for the Bills, and while the loss of Diggs certainly feels significant, the offense is set to flow through second-year tight end Dalton Kincaid.
While that prospect is exciting, it will be a significant shift in philosophy. The margin for error for Beane will be razor-thin if he hopes the draft will keep this offense functioning without missing a beat, but the Bills met with more receivers than any team at the combine in March.
While the draft can be a crap shoot, the Bills intend to be prepared for anything.
The return:
I have seen a lot of criticism of the return the Bills got, getting just a second-round pick in 2025.
When you take Diggs’ age, contract and diminishing production into account, a second-rounder feels like quite a win for Beane. Especially when you consider that former No. 1 wide receivers like Keenan Allen and Amari Cooper went for Day 3 picks.
Getting a top-75 pick for Diggs feels like a win.
The Allen factor:
To me, this is the most fascinating aspect of the trade.
With the impact Allen has within the organization, at any point, Allen could have stopped this trade from happening. Even if Diggs did request a trade like I had earlier predicted, Allen could have done whatever it took to keep Diggs around if he wanted to. He could have drawn a line in the sand and told the organization trading Diggs was a non-starter.
He didn’t.
I think it speaks to the deeper issues with both Allen and Diggs that started at the end of the 2022 season.
Don’t get it twisted, Diggs and Allen were at odds. Diggs appeared to be sending a message to his star quarterback by not showing up to minicamp. This gets put on Diggs and his reputation of creating drama out of nothing, but his frustrations with Allen’s dedication and focus were real, and it felt like Allen was never really able to win back the full trust of his star receiver.
No, Allen wasn’t the cause of his diminished play in the second half of last season. No, it wasn’t his fault Diggs had critical drops against the Kansas City Chiefs.
However, Allen did have a large roll in the souring of their personal relationship.
How Diggs should be remembered:
To me, Diggs should be remembered as one of the best wide receivers to ever put on a Bills uniform, because he was.
He’ll finish fourth all-time for the Bills in nearly every major receiving category, and be a big part of why Allen turned into the superstar he is today.
A lot of fans will likely remember Diggs for the tweets and sideline lash-outs, and although there’s merit to that frustration, I think Diggs’ legacy in Buffalo was far more positive than it was negative.
Diggs heads to a loaded Houston team, and it will be fascinating to see how he finishes his career.
However, No. 14 will always have a fan in me. He was cool personified. He brought a swagger to Buffalo we hadn’t seen since the '90s.
That, to me, is how I’ll remember Diggs.
