Bills add a high upside difference maker in the pass rush arsenal in this 2025 mock draft
The 2025 offseason is officially underway for the entirety of the NFL. The Buffalo Bills embark on another opportunity to tinker with their roster to finally get over the Super Bowl hump with superstar quarterback Josh Allen at the helm.
The team won’t have a heaping pile of salary cap space at their disposal so the upcoming NFL Draft is going to serve as an opportunity for a cheap and fast option for roster improvement. One of the big storylines of the offseason is the impending moves that need to be made on the defensive side of the ball to get needle movers who can change the course of a game.
The team, as it stands now, has some upcoming holes in the roster with starting cornerback being vacated by pending free agent Rasul Douglas. Veteran Damar Hamlin is likely set to depart the roster this offseason, as well. But the Bills don’t necessarily have a bunch of names leaving this offseason that must be retained in order to avoid massive holes. In fact, there’s very little of in-house work that needs to be done to retain their own. It’s a matter of stacking a higher tier of talent at multiple levels.
One of the areas where the Bills don’t necessarily have a glaring hole is at edge rusher. Starters Greg Rousseau and A.J. Epenesa are set to return. The Bills can also bring back Von Miller along with the return of Javon Solomon in year two after some promising flashes as a rookie. But it’s proven not good enough in high leverage situations in the playoffs. The Philadelphia Eagles were able to expose holes at offensive tackle for the Kansas City Chiefs in the playoffs that the Bills simply didn’t. Rousseau is a fine starter in the league, but he needs a proper running mate. Von Miller’s age and wear can’t be relied upon at this stage and Epenesa’s projection stands as a valuable rotation piece as opposed to a solidified starter.
Luckily for the Bills, it’s a loaded group of pass rushers in this class worthy of first round selection to bolster one of the most important units on the field.
We used the 2025 NFL mock draft simulator from Pro Football Focus to complete a realistic first-round mock draft. The Buffalo Bills are selecting No. 30 overall in the 2025 NFL Draft as things currently stand.
With the 30th pick in the 2025 NFL Draft, the Buffalo Bills select…
Donovan Ezeiruaku, EDGE, Boston College
One player that promises to be mocked to the Bills plenty in the coming months is Donovan Ezeiruaku — one of the most productive and explosive edge rushers in the nation this past season. The true senior put up 16.5 sacks for the Golden Eagles.
Ezeiruaku is a high-caliber athlete who utilizes that athleticism to his advantage — gaining the outside corner of offensive tackles at will in the ACC this past year.
So why is a player with massive production and plus athleticism in the Power 4 slipping to the latter stages of the first round? Well, the easy to answer to that is size limitations. He’s a verified 6’2” 248-pounds per his measurements at the Senior Bowl. He doesn’t have to be a complete outlier at that size, but it’s not a trait that works in his favor. Similar to Javon Solomon from a year ago, he can make up for the lack of height and weight with arm length in some ways. Ezeiruaku has 34.5” verified arm length — larger than the typical threshold for offensive tackles who will tower over him in the NFL.
The Bills need not worry about size thresholds this late in the first round. They need to focus on players who can work to the quarterback and put their stamp on games. Of course, stopping the run remains of huge importance against other AFC foes like Baltimore, but Ezeiruaku isn’t a complete nothing burger as a run defender. There are plenty of times where he uses his length to his advantage and holds up just fine. But there are others when the size shows up. It’s up to a team to take a leap of faith that he can be a four down player in the NFL. If that’s the case, this could be a big time boom pick for the Bills at this stage of the first round.
So yeah Donovan Ezeiruaku is a problem pic.twitter.com/MGMbBWQ4Fn
— JP Acosta (@acosta32_jp) February 14, 2025
The testing at the NFL Scouting Combine upcoming in just a couple of weeks will likely bode well for Ezeiruaku who just came off an impressive showing at the Senior Bowl. He’s checking off all of the boxes to be a first round NFL Draft pick even with the size threshold limitations.