Just before the Buffalo Bills hit the practice field on Monday evening, the team released its first official depth chart of the 2014 season. The listing did not contain much in the way of surprises, but why not take a deeper look at it anyway?

The position that did the most to catch my attention was linebacker, where many different players have taken first-team reps and a little clarity was needed. The still below is a more visual representation of how the Bills have charted their linebackers early in training camp.

The starting trio is not surprising, even though Nigel Bradham has ceded first-team reps on the weak side in more than one practice. Keith Rivers and Brandon Spikes, at this point, are entrenched as starters in the base defense. It's the backup listings that are especially intriguing.

Randell Johnson, who only returned to practice a couple of days ago after spending a good chunk of the offseason recovering from a knee injury, is listed ahead of third-team, undrafted rookie Jimmy Gaines, who is one of the players that has seen first-team work. Even more intriguingly, Ty Powell - an outside linebacker under Mike Pettine and core specialist candidate that the team has spoken highly of all spring - is flopped in as the third-team middle linebacker.

It's days like this that I wish pro football teams built their depth charts around the nickel defense, because they're playing it more than half the time anyway, and that structure might give us a clearer picture of how the team is currently viewing its coverage-down options at the position in the absence of Kiko Alonso.

Some other depth chart items worth discussing briefly:

Here is the full depth chart (minus the listed specialists, for the sake of listing every player only once) in all its glory.