AFC East Notes: Bills, Dolphins, Jets

Bills

Bills GM Brandon Beane mentioned during an interview with WGR 550 Buffalo that second-year WR Zay Jones will have to “earn his way” after a disappointing rookie season.

“He’s not just going to necessarily go right to the top of the line,” Beane said of Jones. “He’ll have to earn his way. Part of that will just be just getting his feel. He’s only played with Nathan Peterman. He has not got to play with Josh Allen or AJ [McCarron] yet. So that bond there will just have to form.”

Dolphins

Barry Jackson of the Miami Herald writes that QB David Fales has “clearly the best of the three contenders for the No. 2 QB job” and has outplayed both Brock Osweiler and Bryce Petty up to this point.

However, Dolphins HC Adam Gase declined to say that the backup job is Fales’ to lose right now.

“Right now, I don’t want to go into that because I don’t have a great answer,” Gase said. “I want to see guys playing in preseason games, how training camp goes.”

Jets

Jets QB Teddy Bridgewater explained that keeping his faith really helped him work himself back to being able to play football again after suffering a devastating knee injury a few years ago.

“It was scary, but at the end of the day, I was still breathing,” Bridgewater said, via the New York Daily News. “Like, ‘Man, I don’t know what just happened, but I know there’s someone out there maybe going through something worse than I am. So, I have to keep my faith and believe that everything is going to be all right…’ All you need is the faith of a mustard seed and you’ll be all right.”

Bridgewater said that seeing the reaction of his teammates is the one thing that sticks out most to him about the injury.

“I think about the reaction of my teammates,” Bridgewater said. “As gruesome as it may have seemed, I feel I did a great job of remaining poised. There were guys throwing helmets. Guys on knees. And I didn’t cry. I didn’t worry. I just knew that it was in God’s hands. So, I think I was impressed with the way I kept my faith. But I just got to see how I meant to the guys not only as a football player, but as a person. Because it could have gone totally south. To be able to stand here right now, I’m thankful to the guys that supported me throughout the injury and the guys that were there for me and are still there for me to this day.”

Bridgewater was able to return last November and appear in a game for the first time since he suffered the knee injury.

“This game means a lot to me,” Bridgewater said. “I’ve been playing football since I was 5 years old. It brought tears to my eyes because it showed me that you’re never out of it. You’re never out of the fight. There were dark days throughout my rehab process. When you’re rehabbing, the light at the end of the tunnel seems so far (away). But to be able to see that light and make it to the light, being active and standing on that sideline with my gear on, it kind of hit me a little.”

“Usually when you have a dream and you wake up and you go back to sleep, you don’t pick up that same dream,” he continued. “For me, I was fortunate enough to go to sleep, wake up, and go back to sleep and pick up my dream right where it left off. So, I’m just blessed to be in this position. Those tears were tears of joy.”