Bills trade up to draft 6-foot-7, 331-pound defensive star from Kentucky, Deone Walker

Billy Heyen

Bills trade up to draft 6-foot-7, 331-pound defensive star from Kentucky, Deone Walker image

The Buffalo Bills are sticking with the all-defense theme.

They traded up in the fourth round of Saturday's NFL Draft to snag the giant defensive tackle from Kentucky, Deone Walker.

Walker measures up at 6-foot-7, 331 pounds. That's a big man.

He might be a steal, too. The ESPN broadcast shared that Walker would've been picked higher if he had come out a year ago.

Walker dealt with a back injury that knocked him down draft boards.

He's the second Bills pick from Kentucky after they got cornerback Maxwell Hairston in the first round.

MORE: Bills' all-defense draft picks are chasing Chiefs

Walker, who ironically wore No. 0 at Kentucky, had a dominant 2023.

That season, he totaled 55 tackles (13 for loss), including 7.5 sacks.

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The back injury limited him to five TFLs and 1.5 sacks in 2024.

If he can be healthy, he can be a huge pickup, literally and figuratively.

The Bills already chose an SEC defensive tackle, T.J. Sanders out of South Carolina. But he isn't as big.

Walker can be the biggest man in the middle for the Buffalo defense of the future. That's a good find in the fourth round.

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Billy Heyen

Billy Heyen is a freelance writer with The Sporting News. He is a 2019 graduate of Syracuse University who has written about many sports and fantasy sports for The Sporting News. Sports reporting work has also appeared in a number of newspapers, including the Sandusky Register and Rochester Democrat & Chronicle