Tyler
Bass.
Tyler
Bass.
Georgia Southern· 5'10"· 185 lb
"A four-year starter who kicked in every kind of weather and never blinked in a game-deciding moment, Bass sells range and repeatable mechanics rather than the clean percentage sheet teams usually want on Day 3."Pre-draft read
A compact, rhythm-driven kicker who works from a tight, repeatable approach and generates real leg power from a 5-10, 183-pound frame. His strike is clean through the ball with a low, driving trajectory that holds its line in wind, and he has shown range past 50 in live games rather than only in warmups. Operation time is quick and consistent.
He also carries kickoff value, driving the ball with hang time that lets a coverage unit work. The separating trait is temperament: he handled late-game attempts without changing tempo or leg speed, and he doubled as an emergency punter, averaging 48.0 yards on five career punts. The mechanics look the same on a chip shot and on a 49-yarder, which is what a coordinator is buying.
Cold-weather outdoor stadium that needs a kicker who can drive the ball through wind and stay useful from 50-plus in December.
Year 1: win an open camp competition and handle field goals and kickoffs. Ceiling: a decade-long franchise kicker who ranks among the league's scoring leaders.
A dome team already paying a veteran, where a rookie kicker gets one preseason of reps and no room for the inevitable early-season misses.
The bet is on the strike and the temperament, not on the college percentage sheet.
Tyler Bass The Kick | Georgia Southern vs Eastern Michigan
The game-deciding college kick that became his calling card for composure.
Under The Helmet: Tyler Bass
Program feature with his kicking operation and mechanics on camera.
61-yard field goal for the lead: Tyler Bass vs. Dolphins
The franchise-record 61-yard game-winner that confirmed the pre-draft range projection.
Bass arrived as a four-year contributor at Georgia Southern who grew from an extra-point specialist into the program's field-goal record holder. The projection was straightforward: legitimate NFL leg strength, a clean repeatable motion, and enough big-moment tape to trust in a competition. Teams drafting him were buying range and mechanics, not a finished accuracy profile.
The production tells the whole story. He made 54 of 68 career field goals with a long of 50 and converted 114 of 116 extra points across 50 games. His best year was 2018, when he hit 19 of 21 field goals at 90.5 percent and scored 102 points; as a senior he set the school record with 20 makes but connected on only 20 of 28. He was a two-time All-Sun Belt pick, earned a Senior Bowl invitation and tested at the combine, which put him on league boards rather than in the undrafted pile.
The flag was consistency in the middle range. The 2019 dip raised the question of whether volume exposed a mechanical flaw or simply reflected longer attempts, and evaluators wanted to know whether Sun Belt conditions translated. Kickers rarely go before the sixth round, and Bass went exactly where the market values one: Buffalo took him 188th, the second kicker ever drafted out of Georgia Southern, to compete for the job immediately.
- 01
Live NFL leg
He hit from 50 and 49 yards in college games, not just in warmups, and drove the ball with the trajectory a cold-weather team needs.
- 02
Repeatable mechanics
His approach and plant stay identical from chip shots to long attempts, which is the single best predictor of translation at the next level.
- 03
Automatic on extra points
He converted 114 of 116 career attempts, including perfect seasons in 2018 and 2019, and never gave away free points.
- 04
Big-moment temperament
Coaches and teammates pointed to his composure on game-deciding kicks, and the tape shows no change in tempo under pressure.
- 05
Emergency punting value
He averaged 48.0 yards on five career punts with a long of 61, a roster-flexibility bonus few kicking prospects offer.
- 01
Senior-year accuracy dip
He connected on only 20 of 28 field goals as a senior, a 71.4 percent rate that sits well below what teams want from a drafted kicker.
- 02
Slight frame
At 5-10 and 183 pounds he is small even by kicker standards, which raises durability questions over a long season of kickoffs.
- 03
Level of competition
Sun Belt conditions and rush units are not an NFL test, and his stadium environment rarely stressed him with wind or crowd noise.
- 04
Thin long-range sample
His career long was 50 yards and he attempted few kicks beyond that, leaving his true ceiling from 55-plus unproven.
| Yr | Team | G | FGM | FGA | FG% | XPM | XPA | Pts |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2016 | Georgia Southern | 12 | 0 | 0 | — | 6 | 7 | 6 |
| 2017 | Georgia Southern | 12 | 15 | 19 | — | 27 | 28 | 72 |
| 2018 | Georgia Southern | 13 | 19 | 21 | — | 45 | 45 | 102 |
| 2019 | Georgia Southern | 13 | 20 | 28 | — | 36 | 36 | 96 |
| Career | — | 50 | 54 | 68 | — | 114 | 116 | 276 |
Four seasons at Georgia Southern, 2016-2019, bowl games included. Season totals sum exactly to the career line of 54-of-68 on field goals and 114-of-116 on extra points across 50 games. He also punted five times for 240 yards (48.0 average) with a long of 61. No field-goal long is listed for 2016 because he did not attempt one.
A dash means the figure is not published by a source we trust — never a zero we invented.
Strong-legged outdoor kicker who wins the job outright and holds it for years at a solid rather than elite rate.
Mid-round kicker with range who turned into a long-term starter for a contender.
Drafted kicker whose accuracy never stabilized in the pros and was gone inside two seasons.
Everything above is the pre-draft evaluation. This section is what actually happened — updated year over year.
Bass won the Buffalo job as a rookie and never handed it back. He made 28 of 34 field goals in 2020 and scored 141 points, a franchise single-season record, then followed with 28 of 32 in 2021, 27 of 31 in 2022, and 24 of 29 in each of 2023 and 2024. He became the first player in Bills history to score at least 120 points in five straight seasons, ranked third in the NFL with 657 points from 2020 through 2024, won AFC Special Teams Player of the Month three times and hit a franchise-record 61-yard game-winner against Miami in November 2024. Buffalo signed him to a four-year extension through 2027 in April 2023. A hip and groin injury that surfaced in the 2025 preseason put him on injured reserve, required surgery and cost him the entire season while Matt Prater kicked in his place.
In hindsight, pick 188 bought a decade-quality starter. The senior-year accuracy dip that pushed him to the sixth round turned out to be noise rather than signal; the leg strength and the mechanical repeatability that showed up on Georgia Southern tape were the real traits, and the 61-yarder in Orchard Park is the cleanest proof of the range projection. The honest caveat is the middle of the field: his percentage settled in the low 80s, and a couple of high-profile playoff misses live in Bills memory. On value returned for a sixth-round pick, this was one of the best selections of the class.