Dawson Knox has made it look easy.

With six games still on the schedule and despite missing two with a broken hand, he owns the Buffalo Bills’ season record for touchdowns by a tight end. He scored two on Thursday night to help slap around the New Orleans Saints in the Superdome.

“It’s exciting,” Knox said afterward. “Obviously, the Bills have had some great tight ends.”

Advertisement

A few reporters exchanged wary glances but didn’t say a word. Maybe because it was Thanksgiving night and everyone was feeling generous, or maybe because deadlines loomed and we were in a hurry, nobody bothered to explain the brutal truth.

The Bills have the NFL’s worst history at tight end. Knox, a third-year pro, already is among the top handful over the club’s 62 seasons.

No tight end is on the Bills’ Wall of Fame. No Bills tight end has been voted All-Pro. No Bills tight end has made a Pro Bowl roster.

One Bills tight end has gained more than 655 yards, and that happened the same year the Doors released their debut album and McDonald’s sold its first Big Mac.

Knox needs 312 more yards to surpass Paul Costa’s 54-year-old record for receiving yards. Costa caught 39 passes for 726 yards and two touchdowns in 1967.

Last year, The Athletic’s Joe Buscaglia wrote about the Bills’ amazing dearth of tight end production for our “Can’t Believe It’s True!” series. The Jacksonville Jaguars are the only other team never to have a tight end who gained at least 750 yards, but Marcedes Lewis was good enough to make the Pro Bowl in 2010, scoring 10 touchdowns.

The Kansas City Chiefs, meanwhile, have had a tight end surpass 750 yards 19 times. The Chargers have done it 15 seasons, the Raiders 13.

Buffalo’s bad luck with tight ends is evident when reviewing its draft history.

Jan White was the 29th selection in 1971, five picks before Hall of Fame linebacker Jack Ham, 14 picks before Hall of Fame tackle Dan Dierdorf, 16 picks before four-time Pro Bowl linebacker Phil Villapiano.

Paul Seymour went seventh in 1973, one pick after the Philadelphia Eagles took tight end Charle Young, an All-Pro as a rookie and a Pro Bowler his first three years. Seymour started all but two games the next couple of years, but on an offense with O.J. Simpson, there weren’t many spirals to snag.

Advertisement

So imagine this: One year later, the Bills took Reuben Gant 18th. Gant didn’t become a full-time starter until 1978, and although he is among the better tight ends in Bills history, drafted after him in 1974 were future Hall of Fame tight end Dave Casper and the entire legendary Pittsburgh Steelers class of Lynn Swann, Jack Lambert, John Stallworth and Mike Webster.

The Bills drafted Tony Hunter 12th in 1983, two picks before their legendary quarterback. They did this because both QBs they wanted — Jim Kelly and Dan Marino — still were on the board; one still would be there two slots later. Thus, the Bills went with the best player at another position.

Hunter made the All-Rookie team, and coach Kay Stephenson envisioned him excelling in a downfield role similar to how the Cleveland Browns used Ozzie Newsome. Yet, after two seasons, the Bills traded Hunter to the Los Angeles Rams for quarterback Vince Ferragamo, whom the Bills cut 10 games into the season. A knee injury ended Hunter’s career after four years.

And we can’t move forward without mentioning the infamous instance when the Bills did not select a tight end.

In 2010, they used the 41st selection on defensive tackle Torell Troup. With the next choice, the New England Patriots snagged a suburban Buffalo kid named Rob Gronkowski.

With that bleak history laid out, let’s review the 10 best tight ends in Bills history and weigh where Knox fits in right now — with a lot of games ahead of him.

10. Lonnie Johnson

Best season (1995): 16 games; 49 catches for 504 yards and one TD.
Bills career: 74 games; 153 catches for 1,489 yards and five TDs.

Although he ranks fifth in receptions and eighth in yards, Johnson never scored more than two touchdowns in any of his five Buffalo seasons. Johnson was drafted 61st in 1994 to take over for Pete Metzelaars and Keith McKeller. Despite a strong first season as the full-time tight end and his proclamations of greatness, Johnson never developed into a true weapon in the Bills’ post-Super Bowl era. Johnson played one more season with the Chiefs, catching 10 passes for 98 yards and a touchdown.

Advertisement

9. Keith McKeller

Best season (1990): 16 games; 34 catches for 464 yards and five TDs.
Bills career: 80 games; 124 catches for 1,464 yards and 11 TDs.

The K-Gun’s namesake would have been a bigger factor on another team, but during a Super Bowl run alongside the likes of Thurman Thomas, Andre Reed and James Lofton and tight end depth that included Metzelaars and Butch Rolle, McKeller played an ancillary role. A 6-foot-6, 240-pound target, McKeller also provided blocking versatility that allowed the Bills to run their no-huddle attack. He wasn’t relied upon much in the postseason, averaging only 16.4 yards a game and scoring no touchdowns.

8. Reuben Gant

Best season (1977): 14 games; 41 catches for 646 yards and two TDs.
Bills career: 101 games; 127 catches for 1,850 yards and 15 TDs.

Gant ranks sixth in receptions, fourth in yards and fourth in touchdowns. He set Buffalo’s tight end record at 31 consecutive games with a catch. But he posted just two seasons with at least 20 catches. He also was a pedestrian blocker. A separated shoulder in the Hall of Fame Game his rookie year led to no catches that season and nine as a sophomore. A year after Gant grabbed 19 passes for 245 yards and two TDs, the back of his 1980 Topps trading card somehow stated Gant was “rapidly becoming one of the NFL’s finest tight ends.” He made a dozen catches that year and was out of the league.

7* Dawson Knox

Best season (2021 through Week 12): nine games; 31 catches for 415 yards and seven TDs.
Bills career: 56 games; 83 catches for 1,091 yards and 12 TDs.

This is where Knox would rank if his career ended today. He rates this highly because he has established himself as a significant contributor on one of the franchise’s most powerful offenses. He has overcome drops and fumbles to become a clutch target for Josh Allen. Unless Knox is stricken by that bad Buffalo tight end luck or becomes too expensive to keep, he and Allen should remain teammates for a long time, putting those career tight end stats in jeopardy. Knox already ranks fifth in tight end TDs and has almost half as many as record-holder Metzelaars, who played a full decade in Buffalo. In the Week 5 victory over Kansas City, Knox’s 117 yards were the most by a Buffalo tight end since the NFL-AFL merger.

* and climbing

6. Scott Chandler

Best season (2012): 15 games; 43 catches for 571 yards and six TDs.
Bills career: 65 games; 182 catches for 2,120 yards and 17 TDs.

Advertisement

Chandler ranks third across the board in catches, yards and touchdowns for entertaining-but-often-overmatched Bills drought teams. He was a fantastic target at 6-7 and 270 pounds, but despite his size, he was a subpar blocker. He fizzled with the San Diego Chargers, New York Giants and in two stops with the Dallas Cowboys before Chan Gailey found a way to deploy him effectively. Chandler had two seasons with six touchdowns, tying him for the team record among tight ends until Knox broke it Thursday.

5. Jay Riemersma

Best season (2001): 16 games; 53 catches for 590 yards and three TDs.
Bills career: 90 games; 204 catches for 2,304 yards and 20 TDs.

Riemersma ranks second across the board in receptions, yards and touchdowns while playing only the fifth-most games. He was an overachiever who enrolled at Michigan as a quarterback, converted to tight end after a shoulder injury, wasn’t drafted until the seventh round and didn’t play as a rookie. Riemersma scored six touchdowns on 25 catches in 1998 and five touchdowns on 31 catches in 2000.

4. Charles Clay

Best season (2016): 15 games; 57 catches for 552 yards and four TDs.
Bills career: 54 games; 178 catches for 1,822 and nine TDs.

Unable to draft a tight end over the decades, the Bills in 2015 finally signed a coveted free agent for the job, prying him away from the Miami Dolphins. Clay aggravated Bills fans because of his bad knees and the coaching staff’s inability to unlock him, but his statistical production was better than most in team history. He lasted four seasons and averaged 33.7 yards a game, highest for a Bills tight end. He ranks fourth in receptions and fifth in yards. Clay is the lone Bills tight end with three seasons of at least 525 yards.

3. Pete Metzelaars

Best season (1993): 16 games; 68 catches for 609 yards and four TDs.
Bills career: 156 games; 302 catches for 2,921 yards and 25 TDs.

Metzelaars is beloved as the tight end from the four Super Bowl teams, and his longevity puts him atop most statistical categories. Counting the postseason, he has over 100 more catches than the next guy on the list. He twice caught 10 passes in a game. But to put Metzelaars in NFL context, his 25 touchdowns are tied for 65th all time. The Seattle Seahawks are the only club with a lower record (Jimmy Graham scored 18). Eleven teams have at least three tight ends who have scored more touchdowns than Metzelaars.

Advertisement

2. Paul Costa

Best season (1967): 14 games, 39 catches for 726 yards and two TDs.
Bills career: 52 games (as a tight end); 102 catches for 1,699 yards and six TDs.

Probably the best combination of a receiver and a blocker in Bills tight end history, the 6-6, 268-pound Costa’s counting stats are limited because of coach John Rauch’s decision to move him to tackle full time in 1969. Costa was an AFL All-Star (credited as a “Pro Bowl” season after the merger) his first two seasons. He averaged 32.7 yards a game, second in club history, but he was more dangerous than that. Consider that Clay averaged 10.2 yards per catch; Costa averaged 19.1 yards his first season and 18.6 yards his third.

1. Ernie Warlick

Best season (1962): 14 games; 35 catches for 482 yards and two TDs.
Bills career: 56 games; 90 catches for 1,551 yards and four TDs.

Warlick didn’t join the Bills until he was 30, having spent the previous four years with the Calgary Stampeders of the CFL, where he was a three-time All-Star. “Big Hoss” resumed his production in Buffalo, averaging 17.2 yards a catch over his career, most for a tight end with more than eight receptions. He was voted an AFL All-Star each of his first three seasons and made a fourth as an AFL champion (against the college all-stars) in 1965, his final season. Costa overtook him as a starter that year, but Warlick returned to the lineup for the championship game as a blocker against the San Diego Chargers. The Bills went to a double-tight-end formation to cope with the losses of center Dave Behrman and Hall of Fame guard Billy Shaw, knocked unconscious on the opening kickoff. Warlick scored the first — and only offensive — touchdown in a 23-0 victory.

(Top photo: Joshua Bessex / Getty Images)

ncG1vNJzZmismJqutbTLnquim16YvK57kXJvcHBjbHxzfJFqZmppX2h9cLXSZpuar6Oku263zaivZpmcp7KisNhmq6GdXZeytMCMraCgoKRisq%2BwjKKlZpqZobm0eceiqq2noq58