We now know who the Buffalo Bills punt returner will be for Week 1… and presumably longer than that.
Greg Dortch.
The team announced Saturday afternoon they will be elevating Dortch for their season-opening contest against the Houston Texans:
This makes all the sense in the world for the Bills, especially because after the preseason, they did not have someone who earned the punt-return job, which led to their acquisition of Dortch after he was surprisingly released by the Detroit Lions.
Dortch has 99 punt returns on his NFL resume to date and raised his average in each of the last four seasons. His 11.6 yards-per-return average a season ago was tied for the seventh-best in football.
I also love this decision by the Bills because of what Dortch can bring to the field as a receiver. Remember, Buffalo only kept five wideouts on its initial 53-man roster. Dortch makes six. He has established himself as a gadget-y, underneath possession target in the NFL with 145 catches for 1,310 yards in his six-year professional career to date.
In the article linked in the previous paragraph, I highlighted Dortch’s excellent YAC capabilities, and I’ll repeat the key metric here — Dortch has forced 25 missed tackles over the past two seasons on just 79 targets and 66 receptions. That’s absurd.
We’ll see if Dortch gets any looks on offense against the Texans, but he’s all but officially guaranteed to be returning punts in this game.
As for Frank Gore Jr., his elevation hints at Ty Johnson, who’s listed as questionable for this outing in Houston, is unlikely to play.
The son of the back with the third-most career rushing yards in the NFL history had his third-consecutive strong preseason with the Bills, as he averaged 4.6 yards per tote on 26 attempts. The 24 year old has yet to carry the ball in regular-season game but was active for Buffalo’s wild-card win over the Jaguars in January and had one reception for six yards. He just might factor into the offense for the Bills in this game against Houston to begin the 2026 regular season.
