The Buffalo Bills need to upgrade their skill position players in the 2023 NFL Draft. With no true game-breaking No. 1 wide receiver in the first round, that means picking a running back at No. 27 makes the most sense. After the NFL Scouting Combine, Texas RB Bijan Robinson is still the top player at the position on the board. Here’s why a Bijan Robinson Bills pick is a perfect fit.

Bijan Robinson is a perfect fit for the Bills roster in NFL Draft

The Bills need to crush the 2023 NFL Draft.

In 2017 and 2018, Bills general manager Brandon Beane took five Pro Bowl players that made up the core of the team for the last half-decade in Tre’Davious White, Dion Dawkins, Matt Milano, Tremaine Edmunds, and, of course, Josh Allen.

However, since then, Beane hasn’t taken a single Pro Bowl player in the last four drafts. The team has taken plenty of good players and quite a few starters, but none of whom are at the top of the league at their positions.

This showed up in a big way in the 2022 AFC Divisional Round when the Cincinnati Bengals easily beat the Bills at home, 27-10, and looked like the more talented team while doing it.

One of the biggest weak spots on the roster is at running back. Beane drafted Devin Singletary, Zach Moss, and James Cook in 2019, 2020, and 2022, respectively. He then traded Moss for Nyheim Hines at the 2022 trade deadline.

Singletary is the best all-around back of this bunch. But at 5-foot-7, 203 pounds, he’s not an every-down, run-between-the-tackles RB. And because of that, he’s never rushed for more than 870 yards in a season.

Last year, the Bills finished ninth in rushing yards, despite playing just 16 games. That’s not bad at all. However, take away quarterback Josh Allen’s 762 yards, and the Bills fall to 31st. The same thing happened in 2021. Buffalo finished sixth in rushing yards but 31st without Allen’s contributions.

The moral of the story is the team needs a star running back, and there is no bigger star running back in the 2023 NFL Draft than Bijan Robinson.

The Texas Longhorns RB ran for 3,410 yards on 539 carries in three seasons in Austin with 60 catches, 805 receiving yards, and 41 total touchdowns.

At the NFL Scouting Combine, Robinson measured 5-foot-11, 215 pounds, and ran a 4.46-second 40-yard dash. He also put up a 37-inch vertical jump and a 10-foot-four-inch broad jump. Those numbers were sixth, sixth, and fourth among all RB prospects.

Add those NFL Scouting combine numbers to the tape and the production, and that makes Robinson the best NFL prospect at the position since Saquon Barkley.

Barkley is an apt comparison here. Both he and Robinson are fast, powerful, skilled, explosive, and sudden. They both can break tackles and finish runs with authority, both in the open field and in short-yardage situations.

A Bijan Robinson-Bills marriage would be like Allen having Barkley by his side, which you can imagine after watching what the New York Giants back did with Daniel Jones under former Buffalo offensive coordinator Brian Daboll this season.

In fairness, just picking Robinson in the 2023 NFL Draft isn’t enough to get the Bills back on track. New offensive coordinator Ken Dorsey also needs to do a better job calling the run game, and Allen needs to improve on using his backs out of the backfield instead of trying to play hero ball on every play.

That said, a Bijan Robinson-Bills pairing in 2023 would be a matchup nightmare for defensive coordinators.

Picking Robinson at No. 27 after his NFL Scouting Combine performance won’t be easy. Yes, many teams shy away these days from first-round running backs, but Robinson is a special case. And while he likely won’t go in the top 10, the teens or early 20s are certainly possible.

Brandon Beane may have to trade up to get his guy at the NFL draft, but it’s worth it.

The other top RBs — Jahmyr Gibbs from Alabama, Sean Tucker from Syracuse, Zach Charbonnet from UCLA, and Tank Bigsby from Auburn — all either didn’t match up to Robinson at the NFL Scouting Combine or are too similar to the backs the Bills already have. They could be good picks, but likely not great ones.

Super Bowl windows close quickly in the NFL, and after Beane’s below-average drafting the last few years, the Bills’ window is shrinking. Putting Bijan Robinson in a Bills uniform at the NFL draft is a way to thrust that window back open and maybe even get Buffalo over the playoff hump they have yet to climb.