Bills

Bills HC Sean McDermott emphasized the importance of the team’s rookies stepping up and playing crucial roles this year.

“The interesting thing is we’re going to have to depend on some of these young guys in this draft class to help us and play this year,” McDermott noted, via Bills Wire. “Getting them acclimated to the life in the NFL and getting them adjusted to the NFL schemes is going to take some time.”

Bills WR Keon Coleman and S Cole Bishop are both expected to be Week 1 starters.

“You talk about personalities – both Keon and Cole have them, but they’re different,” McDermott observed. “I’m really looking forward to getting around them and getting to know them and see what they bring onto the football field.”

Jets

Jets HC Robert Saleh is considering assigning CB Sauce Gardner to shadow the opposing team’s top wide receiver this season, although it may vary on a game-to-game basis.

“I’m always looking forward to the challenge,” Gardner expressed, via Antwan Staley of the New York Daily News. “I would like to call myself one of the best in the game, if not the best. I’m always ready to compete and challenge myself, challenge other people. I just want to do whatever it takes to help the team win. That’s what it is all about.”

“He’s a weapon we can use from the defensive standpoint, but to say it’ll be exclusive, I’m not going to say that,” Saleh commented about Gardner. “But he did last year, to say he might do a little bit more that’s a possibility, but I think it’s going to be more game to game.”

Patriots

Patriots WR JuJu Smith-Schuster is feeling fully healthy as he enters his second season in New England.

“It’s a big difference,” Smith-Schuster remarked on Monday, via PFT. “It’s not easy coming off a knee injury and having a long season and coming back really short. . . . I feel great, honestly. I feel great. I’ve never felt better. I’m just excited to finally be out here around this time and participating.”

Smith-Schuster admitted that he never fully recovered to 100 percent last year, which affected his performance.

“I’ve always wanted to just push through and play,” Smith-Schuster shared. “I had some injuries that I was dealing with, and I just kept pushing through it and playing. That’s just the competitiveness in me. I don’t mind that. So this year it’s a lot different than how it was.”