The buzz word around Orchard Park during Amari Cooper's first day on campus wasn't surprising. "Excited." His new teammates described their reaction to Tuesday's trade using that world almost to a man. Khalil Shakir's story about how he found out the trade happened was almost the opposite of exciting. "I was actually asleep. My wife woke me up because if I sleep too long, I'll be up all night," Shakir recounted. "She's like, 'You need to get up. Oh, also... y'all just traded for Amari Cooper'." Once Shakir shook the just-woke-up-from-a-nap cobwebs, there was a jolt of energy. "I was stoked. I've been fortunate to play with some pretty good receivers. Diggs, Gabe, Beasley and now him," Shakir said of Cooper. "I'm excited to watch him in action and learn from him." Shakir's enthusiasm was shared throughout the locker room. "Been a big fan of his for a very long time. Very smart, very detailed in the way that he runs routes," Josh Allen said. "I think he can help us." "You got a guy like that, that caliber of player, you know he's going to put in the work," Ty Johnson said. "He's going to learn the system. He's going to do his job and he's going to make plays. You can't be nothing but excited." The Bills last faced Cooper in 2022. It was the home game against the Browns that had to be moved to Detroit because of a snowstorm in Buffalo. The Bills won the game relatively comfortably 31-23, but Cooper was a huge pain. He finished with eight catches for 113 yards and two scores. Taron Johnson was on the field for that game. When asked what he remembers most about Cooper, the first word out of his mouth was "explosive". "It's great for us. Obviously he's a great player. He's been a great player in this league for a long time," Johnson said. "So having a guy like that is super helpful. I'm just excited." "When you have somebody like that, you just sit back and watch them," Shakir said. "Somebody who's played that much and played at such a high level for so long... to sit back, watch and learn from him is going to be great." Adding Cooper will be seen as somewhat of an indictment of the Bills current receivers, no matter how much Brandon Beane and Sean McDermott have said they were already happy with the other players in that room. Bills management clearly saw a need for an upgrade and the difficulties passing over the last three games have been evidence of that need. The players in the room aren't concerned. "We don't really pay attention to the outside noise. What everybody else is saying. What we need and what we don't need, whatever that is," Shakir said. "All we can control is what we do when we show up here every day and that's what we've been doing."