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It fills the biggest obvious need on the team.

It adds elite speed to a Buffalo secondary that has lacked it.

Hairston is the fastest defensive player the Bills ever have drafted, with a 40-yard dash time of 4.28 seconds. He was the fastest player at any position in the draft this year. Miami star receiver Tyreek Hill runs 4.29.

鈥淵ou love when the grade matches the value and matches the need,鈥� Bills general Manager Brandon Beane said Thursday night.

Looking at this optimistically, Hairston has the talent to give the Bills an A-plus level player at cornerback. That鈥檚 a legitimate knock on the Bills right now. They have a load of good defensive players, B players and B-plus players, but not enough defensive superstars. They need another player who could be top eight in the league at his position.

Who currently fits that description? Probably only slot cornerback Taron Johnson. Matt Milano is top eight at weak-side linebacker when he鈥檚 fully healthy and at his best, but he has been mostly hurt the past two years. Defensive tackle Ed Oliver arguably is top 12 at defensive tackle when he鈥檚 at his best, but he wasn鈥檛 last season.

Looking at this realistically, Hairston at the least brings an injection of talent and sticky-coverage ability to the cornerback room.

As everyone saw in the playoff loss in Kansas City, when the Chiefs went to a quick-game passing attack to start the game, the Bills did not have the talent at corner to take away quick throws, especially after Christian Benford got hurt in the first half. Kaiir Elam flopped in man coverage. Rasul Douglas is an off-coverage zone corner on the back end of his career. He wasn鈥檛 taking away the quick throws.

Tight coverage and good pass rush go hand in hand. The Bills have had enough to be a winning defense but not enough to get over the playoff hump.

They鈥檙e banking on 10th-year veteran Joey Bosa to be the big pass rushing upgrade, presuming he can stay healthy. The last time he did was 2021, when he had 10.5 sacks.

The risk on Hairston is that he has a lean body. He weighed 183 at the NFL scouting combine in February, but Beane said he鈥檚 up to 192 now.

The Bills put a big priority on their cornerbacks being able to tackle to defend the outside against the run. Hairston didn鈥檛 get A grades on tackling at Kentucky. But he did get praise for being feisty and going after it in the run game. Beane called Hairston a 鈥渨illing鈥� tackler.

鈥淪o we鈥檒l continue to get him in our weight program and get him sturdy,鈥� Beane said. 鈥淏ut it鈥檚 not from a lack of effort. And he鈥檚 got, obviously, the coverage skills, ball skills that you look for in a corner.鈥�

Hairston makes plays on the ball. He had five interceptions and 11 pass breakups in 2023. He shows instinctiveness in reacting in zone coverage. He has the tools to play some man coverage.

A lot of these traits were used to describe Elam when the Bills picked him 23rd overall in 2022. Elam was shipped off in March to Dallas for a bag of popcorn.

It鈥檚 a sobering fact, as The News鈥� Ryan O鈥橦alloran wrote this week, that of 33 cornerbacks drafted in the first round from 2015 to 2022, 15 were 鈥渉its鈥� and 18 were 鈥渕isses.鈥�

The Bills acknowledged they did a thorough post-mortem on what went wrong with their selection of Elam. Obviously, they鈥檙e not going to divulge their specific conclusions.

However, there were some chinks in Elam’s resume. He didn’t play great in 2021, his last season at the University of Florida. analyst Lance Zierlein wrote before the 2022 draft that Elam was “inconsistent staying connected to the early stages of the route,” a problem that evidenced itself in Buffalo. He also was beaten on deep balls his last college season in games against Alabama, Arkansas and Georgia.

Not letting good traits overshadow less-than-great production is one lesson in the Elam whiff. Elam also lost confidence after this rookie season. The Bills must make sure that doesn鈥檛 happen.

What other direction could the Bills have gone? Edge rusher.

Boston College鈥檚 Donovan Ezeiruaku still was on the board at No. 30. He had 16.5 sacks and brings speed and bend off the edge the Bills could use. From this perspective, good edge rushers are a little harder to find than good cornerbacks. Ezeiruaku could have been the successor to Bosa on the defensive line. The knock on Ezeiruaku is he鈥檚 not a big run defender at 248 pounds.

Maybe that tilted the Bills鈥� scales in favor of Hairston. The three teams that picked ahead of the Bills 鈥� Baltimore, Detroit and Washington 鈥� all had some level of need at edge rusher and all passed on Ezeiruaku.

But the Bills have two picks in the second round that offer the chance to address the defensive line.

At cornerback, Benford and Johnson are locked up for the long term. If the Bills have learned the key lessons from the Elam mistake, they will be all set at the position.