The NFL has made a tradition out of having retired players announce their former team’s draft picks.
During the 2019 NFL Draft in Nashville, Tenn., Eric Wood, Buffalo’s former Pro Bowl center, and Stevie Johnson, Buffalo’s former charismatic wide receiver, will announce second- and third-round draft picks for the Bills, the NFL said on Thursday.
Wood will make Buffalo’s second-round selection (pick No. 40) as the league reserving this honor for former first-round picks. Wood, a standout at the University of Louisville, was drafted by Buffalo with the No. 28 overall pick in the 2009 NFL Draft and played nine seasons with the Buffalo Bills before retiring after the 2017 season with a neck injury.
Johnson, a seventh-round selection out of the University of Kentucky, will take the stage to announce Buffalo’s third-round pick (No. 74) as the league is having late-round draft picks announce each team’s selection. Johnson spent the first six seasons of his NFL career with the Bills, catching 301 passes for 3,832 yards with 28 touchdowns. He retired after the 2015 season.
64 former and active players will announce selections at the 2019 NFL Draft (Rounds 2 and 3).
— NFL Update (@MySportsUpdate) April 4, 2019
Names include: Terrell Owens, Shaun Alexander, Charles Woodson, Orlando Pace, Christian McCaffrey, Kam Chancellor, DeAndre Hopkins & Geno Atkins
Full list below: pic.twitter.com/W3sIVBrvvu
Besides Wood and Johnson, four other former Bills—linebacker Shawne Merriman, and wide receivers James Lofton, Terrell Owens, and Brad Smith—will also reveal draft picks during the annual draft.
Lofton and Merriman will make second-round picks for the Green Bay Packers and Los Angeles Chargers, respectively, while Owens and Smith will announce third-round picks for the San Francisco 49ers and New York Jets, respectively.
Additionally, Lovely A. Warren, mayor of the city of Rochester, will be joined by either a Bills player or NFL alumni to make the Bills’ sixth-round pick (No. 181) as part of the “NFL100” celebration honoring the league’s 100th anniversary and the original towns that first housed teams. The Rochester Jeffersons were one of the 14 participating teams from the NFL’s inaugural season of 1920.