Bills are still trying to believe in WR Keon Coleman

The Buffalo Bills have spent several years trying to find the right combination of wide receivers to fit around superstar quarterback Josh Allen. The results have been mixed, to say the least.

One of the players who was supposed to be a key part of their offense and a long-term solution was 2024 second-round pick Keon Coleman. But the first two years of his career have been wildly inconsistent at best, and massively disappointing at worst. 

He also got thrown into the offseason drama when Bills owner Terry Pegula blamed the former coaching staff for his selection, trying to take the pressure off returning general manager Brandon Beane.

Nothing about his career has been smooth.

Now that he is entering year three of his career, and what is almost certainly a pivotal training camp, Beane and the Bills are still trying to find their belief in Coleman's ability to break through.

Bills still want to believe in wide receiver Keon Coleman

Beane was extremely complimentary of the maturity that Coleman has shown this offseason, and pointed out a sequence of plays early in camp that produced a dropped ball, and then coming back one play later and making an even tougher catch.

From Beane's Wednesday press conference:

“I think back to when I was 21, 22, there’s things that,, gosh I probably should’ve done that a little bit better. So I like to remind everyone, were his first two years perfect? No. But, if you just talk to him and are around him, you feel a guy growing into his own, comfortable in his skin, and just know that I can’t do the same things that I did the first two years and expect to have success on the field or in the locker room with my teammates. And his teammates see it. He dropped the first ball today, and I saw three guys come over and dap him up. Josh comes right back to him the next play, a much harder play, and he makes it.”

Beane went on to praise Coleman for the way he has handled everything over the past year, from being benched to the Pegula press conference to all of the offseason moves the team made around him. 

That is all encouraging for the Bills.

But it is also easy for that to happen in July. 

It is one thing to come back and make a tough catch when there are no real stakes in an early training camp practice.

The big test for Coleman and the Bills is what is going to happen when they are actually on the field in live-game situations, whether it be preseason or the regular season, and how all of that plays out. That same maturity and approach not only has to continue, but it has to be joined by actual production and plays on the field.

In two years with the Bills, Coleman has caught 67 passes for 960 yards and eight touchdowns. That includes 38 catches for 404 yards and four touchdowns during the 2025 season. They are not bad numbers. They are just not impact numbers, nor has there been any sort of consistency in how they have been accumulated.