The gift for playing one snap last season for the Buffalo Bills? Quarterback Matt Cassel can take his wife out to dinner.
Cassel was awarded $58.73 in performance-based pay by the Bills for the 2015 season, the lowest amount given to one player of any team, according to data distributed Monday by the NFL.
Performance-based pay is granted after every season and awards the most to players who played the highest number of snaps for the lowest salaries. Each team was given $3.802 million to distribute based on the formula; Cassel received the smallest portion of the Bills' pool, which does not count against the salary cap.
Cassel took the field for the Bills for the first play of their 2015-16 season opener, technically recording the start at quarterback as part of a trick play that resulted in a six-yard loss by LeSean McCoy. That was Cassel's only snap for Buffalo before the team traded him Sept. 22 to the Dallas Cowboys.
Kicker Billy Cundiff received the second-lowest amount for the Bills, taking home an extra $1,044.16. He played one game, kicking off three times against the Tennessee Titans in Week 5.
On the opposite end of the spectrum, linebacker Preston Brown received the team's highest payout of $263,842, a result of Brown playing in nearly 80 percent of snaps and only being paid $702,000 in salary.
Receiver Chris Hogan ($204,819), safety Bacarri Rambo ($202,084), defensive tackle Corbin Bryant ($200,353) and tackle Seantrel Henderson ($182,569) rounded out the top five in performance-based pay for Buffalo.
