Bills’ Knox to have wrist surgery; out indefinitely

BUFFALO, N.Y. — Buffalo Bills tight end Dawson Knox will undergo surgery on his injured wrist, coach Sean McDermott said Monday.

McDermott said that it is too soon to know how much time Knox will miss.

“I wish I could tell you,” McDermott said. “Too early right now. The decision was just made to go ahead and get that done.”

Knox, in his fifth season, initially injured his right wrist in the Bills’ Week 5 loss to the Jacksonville Jaguars. He was then limited in practice leading up to the team’s game vs. the New York Giants and played 75.4% of offensive snaps in the win. This past week, Knox was listed on the injury report but fully participated in all three practices and played 63.4% of offensive snaps in Sunday’s loss to the New England Patriots.

Knox, 26, has caught 15 passes for 102 yards and one touchdown this season. His role as a receiver has decreased with the addition of first-round pick Dalton Kincaid, although the team is fourth in the league in 12 personnel usage (31.2%), with part of the goal in drafting Kincaid being to get both players on the field at the same time. Last season the Bills ran 12 personnel on 11.9% of plays, the fifth-lowest rate.

The Bills, however, ran their second-lowest rate of 12 personnel plays of the season (21.2%) in Sunday’s 29-25 loss to the Patriots. The only lower rate came in Week 6, which Kincaid missed because of a concussion. Against the Patriots, Knox was unable to hang onto a key fourth-down pass in the fourth quarter after it was knocked loose by linebacker Ja’Whaun Bentley.

The third tight end on the 53-man roster, Quintin Morris, missed Sunday’s game with an ankle injury, and was listed as did not participate after the team held a walk-through on Monday ahead of playing the Tampa Bay Buccaneers on Thursday (8:15 p.m. ET., Prime Video). Knox also did not participate.

Kincaid will need to continue to step up for the Bills and is coming off a career-best performance with eight receptions on eight targets for 75 yards. He has yet to score a touchdown.

“Very impressed and it was great to see [Dalton’s performance], honestly,” McDermott said. “It’s good for our offense. The question was asked earlier about some of the things I saw yesterday, and I was happy with that to say the least. That’s something that we’ve needed to get, needed to get going for some time now. And obviously he was out the week prior with the concussion, so it’s good to see him getting going and building a rapport with Josh [Allen] and I think that can help us as we move forward here.”

Advertisement