1. Cody Ford impresses
He had 18 snaps at right guard with the starting offensive line and then 15 snaps at right tackle with the second unit in Thursday night's preseason opener against Indianapolis. For a rookie in his debut performance, one might understand if there were some miscues along the way. That was not the case for Cody Ford.
"I liked the way that he played," said head coach Sean McDermott, who was generally pleased with his starting five up front Thursday night. "I liked the way Ty (Nsekhe) played as well outside, when Cody was inside. Jon (Feliciano) and Quinton Spain did some good things as well as Dion (Dawkins), so I thought the first five did some good things in there.
"Then we moved Cody outside and Spencer (Long) came in and did some nice things. There were some good pieces moving out there and guys were battling. By in large our quarterbacks had some time in the pocket to do some things."
Time is growing short for the Bills to nail down who their top five linemen will be on the starting unit. It will be interesting to see if the performance on Thursday night by the starting O-line will continue to be assembled together going forward.
2. More injuries for O-line
They weren't on the starting offensive line Thursday night, but two more linemen sustained injuries coming out of the Indianapolis game.
"Conor McDermott is in the concussion protocol," said Sean McDermott. "He was cleared during the game last night after an examination, but some symptoms surfaced this morning and he's in the protocol."
McDermott largely played left tackle with the second unit on Thursday night. He left the game to be evaluated for a head injury. Though he was cleared he did not re-enter the game.
Joining him on the injury list was C Russell Bodine.
"Russ Bodine had an oblique strain," said McDermott.
Bodine was the second team center in Thursday night's game after serving as the starting center in practice for most of the week in the absence of Mitch Morse who remains in concussion protocol.
3. Croom returns to practice
On the bright side it looks like the tight end position for the Bills is a bit healthier. Jason Croom returned to the practice setting on Friday.
Coach McDermott said he would be participating in a limited capacity, which likely means he'll just go through individual position drills. The Bills will be extra cautious with Croom knowing he had a recurrence of the same hamstring injury early in camp that kept him out of most of the spring practices.
Fellow tight end Dawson Knox still is not ready to return to action from his hamstring injury.
"He's probably not as far as along at this point as Jason's is," said McDermott. "But he is getting better and will continue to progress in the next couple of days as we move forward."
