{"id":110204,"date":"2026-01-08T09:38:18","date_gmt":"2026-01-08T09:38:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/110204\/"},"modified":"2026-01-08T09:38:18","modified_gmt":"2026-01-08T09:38:18","slug":"bills-sign-former-jaguars-player-ahead-of-sundays-wild-card-playoff-game-in-jacksonville-action-news-jax","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/110204\/","title":{"rendered":"Bills sign former Jaguars player ahead of Sunday\u2019s wild card playoff game in Jacksonville \u2013 Action News Jax"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 jsuuLb body-paragraph\">ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. (AP) \u2014 The playoff-bound Buffalo Bills signed kicker Matthew Wright to their practice squad on Tuesday in a precautionary move in the event Matt Prater is sidelined after aggravating a quadricep injury to his right kicking leg last weekend.<\/p>\n<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 jsuuLb body-paragraph\">The 29-year-old Wright has six seasons of NFL experience and appeared in four games with three teams already this season, including two most recently with the Houston Texans in November. The Bills turned to Wright after he joined kickers Younghoe Koo and Matt Gay in working out for the team earlier in the day.<\/p>\n<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 jsuuLb body-paragraph\">Wright has played at least one game with eight teams since making his NFL debut by appearing in three outings with Pittsburgh in 2020. His most extensive experience came with Jacksonville in 2021, when he hit 21 of 24 field goals and 13 of 15 extra point attempts in 14 games.<\/p>\n<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 jsuuLb body-paragraph\">This season, he\u2019s hit all five field-goal attempts \u2014 including three beyond 40 yards \u2014 and gone 4 of 4 on extra points.<\/p>\n<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 jsuuLb body-paragraph\">Overall, he\u2019s 60 of 68 on field-goal attempts, including 7 of 11 from 50 yards and beyond, and missed just two of 47 extra-point tries.<\/p>\n<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 jsuuLb body-paragraph\">Wright has no postseason experience, though his familiarity with kicking in Jacksonville comes in handy with sixth-seeded Buffalo (12-5) traveling to play the AFC South champion Jaguars (13-4) in a wild-card playoff game on Sunday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 jsuuLb body-paragraph\">Prater\u2019s status is uncertain, with coach Sean McDermott on Monday saying the team would bring in a potential replacement this week. Prater was hurt in the first half of a season-ending 35-8 win over the New York Jets on Sunday in his return after missing two games.<\/p>\n<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 jsuuLb body-paragraph\">Buffalo avoided re-signing Michael Badgley, who missed an extra-point attempt and had another blocked in the two games filling in for Prater. The Bills signed the 41-year-old Prater in the days before their season opener after Tyler Bass was sidelined by hip and groin issues. Bass has since had season-ending surgery.<\/p>\n<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 jsuuLb body-paragraph\">Buffalo freed up a practice squad spot by cutting offensive lineman Richard Gouraige. The Bills also signed former Austin Peay and Temple kicker Maddux Trujillo to a reserve-future contract.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" data-chromatic=\"ignore\" alt=\"\" class=\"c-image\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/https:\/\/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com\/cmg\/275HZB5YRRBB3OQIRKO22X5IKE.jpg\" width=\"1440\"\/><\/p>\n<p class=\"ImageMetadata__MetadataParagraph-sc-1htor29-0 jibCgM image-metadata\">Pittsburgh Steelers sign kicker Matthew Wright from Kansas City Chiefs Kansas City Chiefs place kicker Matthew Wright (19) makes a kick attempt during an NFL football game against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Sunday, Oct. 2, 2022 in Tampa, Fla. The Chiefs defeat the Buccaneers 41-31. (AP Photo\/Peter Joneleit) (Peter Joneleit  \/AP)<\/p>\n<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 jsuuLb body-paragraph\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.actionnewsjax.com\/video\/action-sports-jax-livestream\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.actionnewsjax.com\/video\/action-sports-jax-livestream\/\">&gt;&gt;&gt; STREAM ACTION SPORTS JAX 24\/7 LIVE &lt;&lt;&lt;<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 jsuuLb body-paragraph\">[DOWNLOAD: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.actionnewsjax.com\/mobile-apps\/\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Free Action News Jax app for alerts as news breaks<\/a>]<\/p>\n<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 jsuuLb body-paragraph\">[SIGN UP: <a href=\"https:\/\/membercenter.actionnewsjax.com\/newsletters\/\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Action News Jax Daily Headlines Newsletter<\/a>] <\/p>\n<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 jsuuLb body-paragraph\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.actionnewsjax.com\/mobile-apps\/\" title=\"\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Click here<\/a> to download the free Action News Jax apps, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.actionnewsjax.com\/mobile-apps\/\" title=\"\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">click here<\/a> to download the Action News Jax Now app for your smart TV and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.actionnewsjax.com\/video\/action-sports-jax-livestream\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.actionnewsjax.com\/video\/action-sports-jax-livestream\/\">click here<\/a> to stream Action Sports Jax 24\/7 live.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. (AP) \u2014 The playoff-bound Buffalo Bills signed kicker Matthew Wright to their practice squad on&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":110205,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[56295,116,118,117,56294,23582],"class_list":["post-110204","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-jacksonville","tag-fabs","tag-jacksonville","tag-jacksonville-headlines","tag-jacksonville-news","tag-nflraw22","tag-wpxi"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110204","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=110204"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110204\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/110205"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=110204"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=110204"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=110204"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}