The Buffalo Bills gave Keon Coleman a big vote of confidence over draft weekend.

In not selecting a wide receiver until the seventh round, general manager Brandon Beane made it clear that the franchise expects Coleman will return for his second pro season a better player than he was at the end of Year 1.

It’s not a stretch to say that Coleman’s improvement is one of the most important things that can happen for the Bills’ offense.

“I’m really anxious, man,” Coleman said Wednesday night in a phone conversation with The Buffalo News. “It’s a lot of hard work that I’m putting out. I’m praying that I stay healthy the whole year. It’s going to be a fun year.”

As for whether he feels any pressure, Coleman was quick to respond: “Pressure is a privilege, man. It’s an honor for them to be counting on me. I’m happy to prove them right.”

Beane and coach Sean McDermott were unusually blunt in their critique of Coleman’s rookie season as soon as it ended.

“I would say (I) probably was a little disappointed in the return from the injury,” Beane said at his end-of-season news conference.

Coleman was off to an OK start. Through eight games, he had 396 receiving yards, and his catches and targets per game were on the rise. But he suffered a wrist injury Nov. 3 against Miami and missed more than a month. After his return, he never had more than 64 yards in a single game – and those 64 yards came on a single catch at Detroit.

“He didn’t play his best down the stretch, and some of that probably was due to coming off the injury,” McDermott said. “Kind of got out of sync, out of rhythm a little bit, but it is something that he can learn from and improve on moving forward.”

The wrist injury caused Coleman to miss four games. When he returned in December, he made just seven catches for 139 yards and one touchdown over the final four games. His production fell even more in the postseason, with just three catches for 22 yards in three games. If there was one positive from that stretch, it’s that Coleman said he didn’t feel like the game had gotten faster while he was away.

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With a full offseason to gain more knowledge of the offense and grow comfortable with his role, Coleman should continue to notice the game “slowing down,” as so many pros often say, in his second season.

As for whether the end-of-season feedback from Beane and McDermott was tough to hear, Coleman quickly shot the idea down.

“Nah, it’s not tough to hear,” he said. “I’m always open on how I can get better and how I can better serve us to help the team win, so, (expletive), it was some productive meetings, and it was something I took into the offseason to work on.

“It was things we talked about before they even mentioned it to me. I mentioned it to them, like, ‘We see the same thing. We see the same tape.’”

During Coleman’s absence, the Bills’ offense adjusted. The running game took on added importance. That’s not the only explanation for Coleman’s dip in production, though. To his credit, he owned it.

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“Part of that is part of me not doing what I was supposed to do on the field,” he said. “Getting open at all times, and just missing some opportunities and stuff like that. It’s different. You get a rhythm, get hurt, it’s harder to find that rhythm, you know, when a different volume of balls are coming your way. We’re winning, the run game is popping. There is a lot of different things that can contribute to you not producing how you (were) before that injury.”

Coleman has been taking part in the Bills’ offseason workout program. He spent the past couple of months training at Sports Academy in Frisco, Texas, with an emphasis on strength training.

“He wants to be better. He sent me a couple long texts of wanting to be better,” quarterback Josh Allen said last week. “We’re going to continue to work extremely hard and try to get on the same page. … He’s still so young. He’s 21 right now. He’s still got a long ways to go in terms of learning the nuances of the position. Having the guys in the room that we do, I think they can help him. I’m so excited for his future, because his ability is off the charts.”

The Bills’ receiving group has been a hot topic since the draft, during which their only addition was seventh-round pick Kaden Prather of Maryland.

Beane, of course, was fired up during an interview Monday with WGR-AM 550, saying that complaints about Buffalo not drafting a player at the position earlier than the seventh round “is one of the dumbest arguments I’ve heard.”

The team subsequently signed free agent Elijah Moore to a one-year contract.

Coleman said he has blocked out much of the discussion about the team’s receiver group as a whole this offseason.

“I don’t hear it. I don’t pay that much attention to it. I quite frankly don’t care,” he said. “Plays are going to need to be made. Trust me: We’ve got guys in our room very capable of making those plays. We’ll see when the season rolls around. I’m just saying, the AFC championship game, we got that far. We didn’t get that far without receivers making plays.”

The Bills did indeed finish 13-4 and reach the AFC title game, losing 32-29 in Kansas City. They also did finish No. 2 in the NFL in scoring offense at 30.9 points per game.

However, the team lost receivers Amari Cooper and Mack Hollins from last year’s roster, and before Wednesday, they had added only Joshua Palmer and Laviska Shenault Jr. to the position. So it was fair to wonder whether receiver remained a positional need. The signing of Moore on Wednesday was a sure sign the team agreed.

Moore improves the team’s depth, but Coleman’s growth is the key to unlocking more production from the position – a fact he’s aware of. That’s part of the reason he took it upon himself to contact Allen.

“We missed a lot of things out there on the field last year. I expressed to him I’m looking forward to, ‘Let’s get that connection rolling and building,’” Coleman said. “We can trust each other even more and we’ll be capitalizing a lot more. The ultimate goal (is), we both want to win the Super Bowl. I’m willing to do whatever we need to do to make that happen.”

The Bills start on-field work later this month ahead of June’s mandatory minicamp, the first steps in continuing that on-field relationship between quarterback and receiver. More reps together is the best way to grow that chemistry.

“What can he do to signal that he’s ready for the ball? Just talking over where on certain routes, where he wants the ball,” Allen said. “They call them 50-50 balls, but is that just throw it up? Is that back-shoulder? Is that high? Is it low? I think the more reps that you get at that, the better that you get.”