The Bills spent multiple years with GM Brandon Beane at the helm aiming to construct a hybrid receiving running backs group that could bring athleticism and versatility to their offensive playcalling.

After going through a personnel turnover process, they’ve done just that.

They drafted backs like Devin Singletary (2019) and Zack Moss (2020), later selecting James Cook (2022) and Ray Davis (2022), and also traded for talent like Nyheim Hines (2022), and added Ty Johnson in free agency (2023).

While Buffalo moved forward from the tenures of Singletary, Moss, and Hines, the team now has an RB1 in Cook who has reached an elite level of play in his third year with Buffalo, an efficient backup in Johnson, and a rising talent in Davis.

And now they’ve reached a new point in that process in which Cook is publically making his contract demands for an extension known.

The Pro Bowl starter has made a number of posts on social media stating his desired number to be $15 million a year.

This comes after his older brother, former Minnesota Vikings star turned Dallas Cowboys backup running back Dalvin Cook, posted regularly throughout the 2024 season about giving the younger Cook “the bag” and gassing him up on social platforms.

While this behavior may be characteristic of the elder Cook, who’s had his share of contract negotiations, it may also appear out of character for the younger Cook, and with good reason.

The Bills offensive players have built a reputation this past year for being unselfish, and they have a locker room and culture built on their strong personal relationships and selfless attitudes.

Cook himself is a man of few words who has done his talking with his play on the field and good interaction with fans, which makes the public display (that included mostly wiping the Bills from his social media) all the more unusual.

But also, unnecessary.

Beane and the Bills front office have a track record of taking care of their players contractually as well as conducting business in-house.

In these ways, the running back’s behavior has stood out as a distraction and deviation from his team, which has raised public questions and concerns about whether the Bills should pay him or move on from the running back.

While the older Cook is understandably looking out for his younger Brother, the older vet has not been and is not a part of the Bills team, locker room, and culture and he could be influencing his younger brother to take an approach based more on the standard of his own experiences.

The younger Cook has found a home in Buffalo and is thriving in their offense so much that his performance in the AFC Championship game beckoned the question among media and fans as to why he wasn’t used even more on plays.

It would make sense to extend the Bills’ RB1, he is a competitive talent, a key piece of the offense, and the one-two-punch of Cook with a historical QB in MVP and mobile threat Josh Allen can win at a high level for years to come.

In fact, statistically, Cook won’t find another historical QB at that level to play with outside of Buffalo or Kansas City (despite there being teams competing more for in their divisions than for a Super Bowl that would pay the $15 million price tag.)

It would stand to reason to award him with an extension and a competitive rate raise that reflects his workload. Nothing suggests the Bills weren’t planning to do that, the club’s social media team even included him as they normally would in an Instagram post on Friday.

He even could receive his asking price for a several-year deal that maximizes his prime years. Though having only put up one season at the level he did in 2024 could logically support a contract closer to $12-13M plus performance incentives that could raise it to $15M annually.

$15M would make the 25-year-old the second highest-paid back in the NFL after Christian McCaffrey of the San Francisco 49ers ($16 million per year for four years) and would be followed by the New Orleans Saints Alvin Kamara ($15 million per year for five years,) Indianapolis Colts’ Jonathan Taylor ($14 million per year for three years,) and Philadelphia Eagles now-Super Bowl Champion, Saquon Barkley ($12.6 million per year for three years.)

A contract like Barkley’s and or one with incentives that could reach $15 annually would both be fair offers for an extension since Cook only has one top season to support his request.

With the formidable duo that he and Allen create in the backfield, it would be in the interest of both he and the team to find common ground on a new pact.