I did not scout any member of the Buffalo Bills 2026 UDFA class before the draft. Therefore, I can’t provide my pre-draft thoughts on any of them.
In fact, safety Wande Owens was the only Buffalo Bills UDFA I scouted before the draft in 2025. Because of that, and the fact we’re entering the lone slow period on the NFL calendar, now feels like the perfect time to feature him. And I really think he has a shot to make some noise on this roster.
(By the way, Sean Murphy’s awesome 90 players in 90 days
series starts sooner than you might think, and Owens absolutely will be part of that too.)
My uncle and I text about the Bills a lot — and after every draft he always sends a message asking if I scouted any of the Bills UDFAs. This year, no bueno. A season ago, it was Owens. And he recently followed up asking about the “Yale/New Hampshire kid,” wondering his whereabouts. I admittedly did not know he was still on the Bills roster.
Anytime a UDFA survives an entire season on his original team and remains on the roster the following season, your ears should perk up. Mine certainly did when to my surprise, a quick search of the Bills roster confirmed that Owens, indeed, was still there.
And I have a guess as to why the Bills haven’t given up on the former Yale-turned-New-Hampshire product just yet — he’s a ridiculously explosive athlete.
At 5’11” and 205 pounds, this is how Owens performed during his pro-day workout in 2025 (along with the percentile at the safety position since 1999):
40-Yard Dash: 4.58 seconds (41st percentile)
10-Yard Split: 1.53 seconds (69th)
Vertical: 43 inches (98th)
Broad Jump: 135 inches(97th)
Three-Done: 6.99 seconds (53rd)
Short-Shuttle: 4.05 seconds (87th)
Owens is an electric athlete. There’s no question about it.
And while Owens did not play in any regular season games as rookie — not even that quasi-scrimmage in Week 18 against the Jets to close the old Highmark/New Era/Ralph Wilson/Rich Stadium — he appeared in two preseason games last August.
On 45 snaps against the Giants and Bears, Owens made a rather resounding five tackles — two of which were stops, or tackles that constitute a loss for the offense based on down and distance. In coverage he allowed two catches on two targets in his coverage area for 18 yards and a touchdown without a pass breakup or interception.
In short, he flashed as a ball-seeking tackler and needs more reps in coverage before he or the Bills feel comfortable with him on the field handling those duties.
Buffalo did re-sign special teams gunner ace Sam Franklin Jr. and have Joe Andreessen for another year on his rookie deal — they’ll the club’s incumbent core special teamers. Yet gone is Reggie Gilliam, who logged the third-most special teams snaps (378) on the team in 2025. Other key members of Buffalo’s special teams unit a season ago are also no longer with the team (Cam Lewis, 231 snaps) or rehabbing a serious late-season injury (Tyrell Shavers, 243 snaps).
That means, special teams opportunities are relatively bountiful on the 2026 iteration of the Bills, and entering Year 2 in the NFL, with quality size and elite-level explosiveness, I like Owens to make an impact in minicamp, training camp, and preseason on fourth down, which will inch him closer to seeing regular-season defensive snaps as an insurance option at safety, nickel back, or linebacker.
Owens is my favorite under-the-radar, against-all-odds story at the moment on this Bills team. I’ll be monitoring him closely in the summer months leading into start of the season in September.
