By Budd Bailey, Buffalo Sports Page Columnist

Star Lotulelei – – Signed by the Bills in 2018

You’d expect a big man to sign a big contract in the NFL. That’s true for Star Lotulelei, who has been taking up space (the job description for a defensive tackle) for two years here.

Lotulelei, a native of Tonga, grew up in Utah. He became a first-round pick of Carolina in 2013, and was in the starting lineup on opening day. Star played for five seasons with the Panthers, and played 108 games there. Then in the spring of 2018, unrestricted free agency called, and Buffalo coach Sean McDermott remembered Lotulelei from their days together with the Panthers. $50 million later, Star had a five-year contract.

He’s filled up the middle for the Bills in his two seasons here, just like he did for the Panthers. His contract was reworked in February this year, giving the Bills a little more cap room in the process. It also meant that the Bills were likely to have a Star in their defensive rotation for the next few seasons.

Here’s Star in action:

(Follow Budd on Twitter @WDX2BB)

Budd Bailey

Budd Bailey has been involved in almost every aspect of the local sports scene for the last 40 years. He worked for WEBR Radio, the Buffalo Sabres' public relations department and The Buffalo News during that time. In that time he covered virtually every aspect of the area's sports world, from high schools to the Bills and Sabres and everything in between. Along the way, Budd served as a play-by-play announcer for the Bisons, an analyst for the Stallions, and a talk-show host. He won the National Lacrosse League's Tom Borrelli Award as the media personality of the year in 2011, and was a finalist for that same award in 2017. Budd's seventh and eighth books, one on the Transcontinental Railroad and the other about Ichiro Suzuki, are scheduled to be released in the fall.

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