Tre’Davious White injury likely takes Bills out of AFC contenders

The Buffalo Bills just announced the sort of injury that can alter an entire season. From the outside looking in, the news that cornerback Tre’Davious White is out with an ACL injury seems like it is likely to cripple the Bills’ chances of making any major push for the rest of 2021.

The Buffalo Bills are certainly a talented team with enough impact players to get them to the postseason this year (and most years) with quarterback Josh Allen at the helm. White is not the only Pro Bowl player on the team, and the Bills have a fairly deep roster front to back. However, the loss of White in the Bills’ secondary will shift everything going forward, and teams in the postseason will be able to attack Buffalo now in ways they weren’t able to before.

The idea of White crippling the Bills chances says more about White’s overall talent level and less about the state of the Bills, but you can read something into both. White is a Pro Bowl performer for whom a good argument could be made as the best young pass defender in the game today. He’s a two-time Pro Bowler already and is the Bills lone lockdown option in the secondary, a player with the upside to carry that unit forward for the next five years.

Tre’Davious White’s injury will likely pull them from the AFC race.

Without him, the Bills will look suspect, but they’ve already begun to do so by losing 3 of their last six games, including being embarrassed by the Indianapolis Colts and being held to six points by the Jacksonville Jaguars. They’ve also lost their own division lead in the AFC East to Mac Jones and the New England Patriots.

In a conference where everyone has looked quite mortal since the beginning, the loss of White likely removes the Bills from serious contention—at least for the AFC Championship. Several contenders remain, and we might look silly for writing them off, but it’s hard to picture a scenario in which the Kansas City Chiefs would lose to them right now. Like it or not, the Bills have likely been culled from the pack with the loss of White for the year.