The Buffalo Bills have been dealing with injuries in their secondary all season. Tre’Davious White, their best cornerback, is still recovering from the torn ACL he suffered last season. Safety Micah Hyde, 50% of the NFL’s best duo at his position when healthy, is out for the season with a neck injury. Defensive coordinator Leslie Frazier has been rotating guys in as need be throughout the season, and one of the stars so far has been rookie cornerback Kaiir Elam, the 23rd overall pick in the 2022 draft out of Florida.
Through the first five games of his inaugural NFL campaign, Elam had allowed 17 catches on 23 targets for 176 yards, 72 yards after the catch, no touchdowns, one interception, one pass breakup, and an opponent passer rating of 77.4.
And with 3:28 left in the first quarter of Sunday’s Bills-Chiefs game, Elam came up as big as he possibly could with this end zone interception of Patrick Mahomes, who was pressing to get a touchdown pass to receiver Marquez Valdes-Scantling.
The rookie first-rounder Kaiir Elam gets the end zone INT. 👀
📺: #BUFvsKC on CBS
📱: Stream on NFL+ https://t.co/lvvR5uS0Ex pic.twitter.com/JDlYqQ2UcE— NFL (@NFL) October 16, 2022
Great, acrobatic catch by the rookie, and it couldn’t have come at a better time.
Kaiir Elam's second career INT and Patrick Mahomes' first red zone INT this season pic.twitter.com/sJeBLC4ubk
— Alaina Getzenberg (@agetzenberg) October 16, 2022
