The Buffalo Bills will head back to Rochester this summer for training camp.
The team announced Saturday it has reached an agreement with St. John Fisher College on a one-year deal to bring practices back to the suburban campus in Pittsford for the first time since 2019. The Bills have conducted training camp at their home facility in Orchard Park the past two summers due to protocol restrictions enacted by the NFL as a result of the coronavirus pandemic.
Dates and times for the camp will be announced later this spring, the team said. It’s likely camp will last about two weeks, as was first reported by Rochester’s WHAM-TV. The start of camp is going to depend on exactly when the Bills' regular season begins. The NFL regular-season schedule was released last year on May 12.
The Bills held 10 practices at St. John Fisher in 2019. The team also held two days of joint practices with the Carolina Panthers in Spartanburg, S.C., that summer. They year before, camp at St. John Fisher stretched over 21 days, and there were 14 practices held there.
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The benefits to starting summer practices in Rochester are the ability to create a bit more team bonding with all of the players staying “under one roof” and to allow the team to continue to cultivate the Rochester market and maintain a regional fan base. The practices also provide an opportunity for fans to get up close to the players, and give families who may otherwise not be able to afford tickets to a game at Highmark Stadium a chance to see the team in person.
The Bills’ previous contract with St. John Fisher ran through the 2021 season.
Bills General Manager Brandon Beane indicated this week at the NFL scouting combine that the Bills liked the idea of starting out camp in Rochester.
“If everything works out and they want us and we work it out, we would definitely go there,” Beane said.
Because the Bills have a well-established camp structure on the Fisher campus, Beane said the team didn’t see a need to commit to a long-term agreement this year on camp.
“That's an easy one in the sense that we kind of know that setup,” he said. “It's not home, but it'll feel like home, you know, ‘Hey, we just haven't been here in a couple years.’ ”
