Bills vs. Jets injury report: Jordan Poyer out; two more questionable

Jordan Poyer won’t be among the Buffalo Bills suiting up on Sunday when the AFC East division leaders line up against the New York Jets at MetLife Stadium.

Head coach Sean McDermott announced that the Bills All-Pro safety has been ruled out for the game even before the team hit the practice field on Friday.

On a positive note for the Bills, McDermott also said that all other players are day-to-day and will be active in some capacity, even if it is limited, in Friday’s practice. This would include linebacker Matt Milano, who showed up with an oblique injury on this week’s list, and edge rusher Von Miller, who the Bills’ coach said has just had some soreness. Friday will mark the first day this week that either Milano or Miller have been active in practice as the Bills prepare for the Jets, who currently sit a game and half out of first place in the race for the AFC East title.

Miller doesn’t carry an injury designation into the game, while both Milano and right tackle Spencer Brown (ankle) are officially questionable for the game. Both will likely be game-time decisions.

Poyer re-injured his elbow during last week’s win over the Green Bay Packers, as he could be seen using his left arm to make a tackle. He was immediately ruled out for the remainder of that game, later said that he “heard a pop” and that the injury didn’t feel the same as the one he experienced in training camp in August. Poyer had missed much of training camp and did not play in any preseason games due to a hyper-extended elbow, but was active by Week 1 of the season. It’s interesting to note that during last week’s game, Poyer was not seen wearing the large, hinged brace that he’d been wearing through the first seven weeks of the season.

The Bills lost safety Micah Hyde for the season when he had to have surgery to repair herniated discs in his neck after a collision injury took him out of the game late in Buffalo’s Week 2 win over the Tennessee Titans. Poyer, who has been vocal about seeking a contract extension that will keep him in Buffalo for the remainder of his career, has already missed two games due to injuries not related to his elbow. Poyer missed the Week 3 game against the Miami Dolphins with a foot injury, and Buffalo’s Week 5 win over the Pittsburgh Steelers with a rib injury that turned out to include pneumothorax, or a collapsed lung.

The Bills recently added Dean Marlowe, a familiar face around Orchard Park, NY, to their roster at the trade deadline earlier this week. The veteran safety, who played with the Bills from 2018 through 2020, was acquired from the Atlanta Falcons for a seventh-round draft pick, and will add some experience and depth at a position that has been a huge question mark for a defense that leads the league in points allowed per game.

Marlowe will join Damar Hamlin, who has been filling in for the injured Hyde, Jaquan Johnson, who filled in for Poyer during the weeks he was inactive, and Cam Lewis, who has spent his time on the injury list with an unexplained forearm ailment. While nothing has been verbalized by Buffalo’s coaching staff, it’s reasonable to assume that Marlowe will have no problems sliding back into a defensive scheme that he is familiar with, and is likely to be on the field in New Jersey on Sunday.

Brown has been inactive since early in the Week 6 game against the Kansas City Chiefs, when he memorably refused a ride on the cart and hobbled his way to the locker room with an ankle injury. Milano just showed up on the injury list this week, but when the linebacker missed two days of practice with an oblique injury, confidence in his availability for Sunday was shaky at best.

Should Brown not be ready to go come Sunday, David Quessenberry will continue to fill in—a role he has assumed for both Brown and Ryan Bates at times this season. As for Milano, the inside linebacker has been playing like he’s on a mission to prove that he is worth every penny the Bills are paying him, so it will take a lot for Tyrel Dodson to replace the energy he has been bringing to game days.

More good news came out of One Bills Drive today, though, as all other players on the team’s weekly injury list were full participants and enter the weekend with no game designations, meaning they will likely be suited up and ready to go Sunday afternoon. This is especially good news concerning both Miller, who showed up with a mysterious ankle injury, and Tremaine Edmunds, who had an unexplained heel injury limiting him all week.

As for the Jets, who will host Sunday afternoon’s game, they have ruled out wide receiver Corey Davis who has been struggling with a knee injury. Davis, who has 19 catches for 351 yards—second most on the team—and two touchdowns, will miss his second straight game dealing with the injury he sustained during the Jets’ Week 7 16-9 win over the Denver Broncos.

For the Jets, losing Davis is troublesome. Of the receiver’s 19 catches, 17 of them have been for a first down—a league leading 89.5%. And, to make it even worse, New York is already without rookie running back Breece Hall for the rest of the season as he tore an ACL in the same game as Davis was injured.

The rest of New York’s injury list, however, was promising for Sunday’s host team. Everyone else was listed as full participants for Friday’s practice and there aren’t any game-day designations, indicating they will all be available as the Jets try to close the gap that sits between them and the Bills in the race for the AFC East division title.