Bills GM on keeping UDFA LB Joe Andreessen: He ‘deserves this opportunity’

Buffalo Bills general manager Brandon Beane spoke about keeping undrafted free agent Joe Andreessen on the team's 53-man roster.

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There are hundreds of endearing stories around the NFL—you generally don’t get to a league that hundreds of thousands of children grow up dreaming of playing in without facing some sort of adversity along the way—but few players in today’s league have more fairytale-esque stories than Buffalo Bills linebacker Joe Andreessen.

The 24-year-old signed with Buffalo after going unselected in the 2024 NFL Draft; that seems normal enough, right? Now consider that Andreessen grew up a Bills fan just a short distance away from Highmark Stadium, tailgating outside of the team’s venue while donning a Buffalo jersey as recently as two years ago. He didn’t sign with the team until he tried out at their rookie minicamp, this after an adversity-riddled collegiate career that concluded at his hometown University at Buffalo after a five-year stretch at Division 1 FCS school Bryant.

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Andreessen’s story reads more like a Hollywood script than it does an authentic sports article, but reality is sometimes stranger than fiction. He concluded the ‘boyhood dream’ on Tuesday by earning a spot on Buffalo’s initial 53-man roster of the 2024 NFL season, with general manager Brandon Beane sharing praise about the rookie during his Wednesday media availability.

“Joe, man. Where do you start? Buffalo Joe,” Beane said. “What a story, really cool story for Joe. I don’t know where you start. The guy just shows up, doesn’t say a word. There’s a saying sometimes, ‘don’t count your reps, make every rep you get count.’ I would say Joe is that. Obviously he came in here, came to our local day, did well enough there. We invited him back for our rookie camp, and fortunately, at that time, we still needed to sign another linebacker, and so he stood out the most there. He just, every step of the way, he checked a box, checked a box. Kept himself in play, kept himself in play. 

“Never worried about whether he got five reps in practice or 15, depending on when we were healthy to when we faced some injuries there. We got thin there with Nick [Morrow], Baylon [Spector], obviously losing Matt [Milano]. Some people are ready for their opportunity and others are not. I think Joe did everything you could’ve asked for. He’s still a rookie, okay, so I don’t want to put him in the Hall of Fame yet, but I think we need to give him credit and kudos. How can you not cheer for him? There’s a lot of guys we cheer for that don’t make it, so we still have to make the best decision for the Bills. To this point, he’s done what’s asked, and he earned the opportunity to make our initial 53.”

As Beane alludes to, Andreessen appears to be more than just an endearing story, as he showed genuine promise through the preseason. He tallied 24 tackles throughout the three-game stretch, surprisingly starting with the first-team defense in a Week 2 win over the Pittsburgh Steelers in which he consistently flashed. Andreessen recorded a team-high 12 tackles in the game, including impressive open-field takedowns of dynamic athletes like Justin Fields and Jaylen Warren; Beane spoke about his performance in that particular game, describing it as a source of significant confidence moving forward.

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“One of the things in preseason is who are they going against? Beane said. “Is it threes vs. threes? Threes vs. twos? Twos vs. ones? Matt goes down, we decide to hold [Terrel Bernard] out just to be cautious. Made the decision to put Joe out there and run him with the starters, let’s just see. Nothing else is going to tell us more than putting him with the ones, and first of all, it didn’t phase him. I’m sure he was nervous and had adrenaline pumping, but it didn’t phase him. 

“He went out there, ran the defense to what you would say was really well for a rookie, and made plays, and made plays in space. That was one of the questions on Joe is, how would he do in space? And you saw a play against Fields, obviously the screen against Jaylen Warren. Really good block protection, just getting off blocks. Using his hands, we talk about all the time, guys using their hands, and I thought he really passed the test that day and that probably gave us a lot of confidence that this guy is trending up and deserves this opportunity.”

The story, though unbelievable to this point, is far from over, and it’s now up to Andreessen to continue to impress Buffalo’s brass and make plays when given opportunities in the regular season.

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