Does anyone really want Sam Bradford?

The Buffalo Bills are a reportedly interested in exploring a trade for St. Louis Rams quarterback Sam Bradford. No, wait, scratch that. Ten minutes after that report another one surfaced saying that the Bills were NOT interested in dealing for Bradford. So what gives?

The first report came via Rand Getlin of Yahoo! Sports, citing “multiple league sources.” The Bills were looking to acquire the former first overall pick in the 2010 NFL Draft, not entering the last year of his original $76 million, six-year rookie contract with the Rams.

Amateur general managers had just enough time to fire off a few responses on Twitter before Vic Carucci of the Buffalo News threw a bucket of cold water on the trade talk.

So there you have it, two competing reports on the matter. At any rate, this is only the latest trade talk involving Bradford to surface since the Combine. Jason LaCanfora of CBS Sports reported last Wednesday that the Rams had given Bradford permission to explore a trade, a report that surfaced minutes before Rams GM Les Snead spoke to the press in Indianapolis. A few days later, the Cleveland Browns were kicking the tires on the oft-injured quarterback.

That’s two teams linked, sort of link anyway, to Bradford. So it’s probably worth a quick check to see what’s going on with the situation.

Snead and Rams head coach Jeff Fisher talked up Bradford last week at the Combine. They’ve been Bradford backers since taking over a losing Rams team in 2012 and turning into a losing one that doesn’t lose quite as much as it used to, and the former Sooner signal caller has been at the center of their plans to try and drag the team above .500 for the first time in more than a decade.

Unfortunately, Bradford hasn’t been healthy much since then. He tore his ACL twice, the same one, in less than a year, and he’s missed 25 games over the last two seasons. He also make a lot of money, including a $17.6 million cap hit in 2014 and another $16.6 million this season, with a $13 million salary. The Rams are pressed tightly against the cap for 2015, with plenty of needs left to address. It makes Bradford’s cap hit a prime target.

The Rams and Bradford are currently exploring possibilities for a contract fix, either through a renegotiation of his final year or even an extension that reduces his overall salary and cap hit but keeps him with the team beyond 2015.

Fisher and Snead both made it clear at the Combine that it didn’t make sense to simply cut Bradford, “delete him” is the euphemism used by Snead. And at this point, even for as disappointing as Bradford’s been since winning the Rookie of the Year award in 2010 with a less-than-impressive 6.0 yards per attempt, they really don’t have a viable option to replace him. It’s a bad year for free agent quarterbacks and the Rams pick 10th in the draft, considered by most to be too late to get one of the two best prospects at the position available this year, Jameis Winston and Marcus Mariota.

So what about this trade talk?

The NFL isn’t exactly rife with good quarterbacks ... or even average ones at this point. The Browns have Johnny Manziel, but, uh, he’s not exactly in a good spot right now and coming off a rookie season that exceeded even the worst expectations of cable television talking heads. The Bills have EJ Manuel, who isn’t very good either, and a world of expectations.

Bradford looks positively Flacco-esque to teams like the Bills and Browns.

As for the Rams and Bradford, they could be headed for a breakup, if not this year, then for 2016, when the team can let Bradford walk and will have hopefully rebuilt a woeful offensive line and an iffy cast of skill players for whoever Fisher deems to be his next Kerry Collins salvage project.

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Bradford’s health isn’t going to entice teams to throw a bunch of draft capital at the Rams. His contract isn’t especially attractive either, but that could at least be reworked by a new team. It makes less sense for the Rams to trade him because the only other quarterback they have on the roster at the moment is Austin Davis. The team’s brass did say that they would look at bringing Shaun Hill back, but that’s not going to inspire confidence either. The next best available quarterback beyond Bradford might very well be Mark Sanchez, yeeeesh.

The Rams aren’t likely to fetch much in return for Bradford. A few have suggested a second-round pick at best, a conditional one at that. That leaves the Rams betting on Bradford’s health too, even by getting rid of him.

It’s impossible to say where the Bills/Bradford trade rumor came from. Talking up potentially interested teams could benefit Bradford’s agent by helping drive up the asking price in contract renegotiation talks with the Rams.

A trade seems out of the question, for now anyway, unless something happens closer to the draft and the Rams think they can deal upwards to get Winston or Mariota, neither one of whom seem like a fit in an offense that prizes fealty over playmaking from its quarterbacks.

The most likely outcome is that Bradford sticks around for 2015. It might even be enough to spur a true extension, keeping him in St. Louis (and/or Los Angeles) beyond the coming season.