Very little went well for Josh Allen in a disappointing game Thursday night versus the Texans.
Yet he came close to willing the Buffalo Bills to a win before an interception in the final minute sealed their fate in a close loss.
Allen took consecutive tackles for loss on the team's last drive, resulting in a long fourth down, but Buffalo (with seven wins) gained significant yardage on a quick throw from Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a lateral to another teammate.
Following a false-start penalty created a fourth down situation for Buffalo, Calen Bullock picked off the quarterback's throw at the 9-yard line with 24 seconds remaining.
“We had a opportunity to win it there at the conclusion,” Josh Allen stated. “We did a good job of staying in it and our defensive unit bailed us out a few instances. We must figure it out, and we didn’t.”
Proved tough for the signal-caller to get anything going on a evening he was brought down a personal-worst eight times and hit four additional instances. The QB threw for 253 passing yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after accounting for six TDs in a win over the Buccaneers last week.
“When they pressure our quarterback 12 times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach McDermott said. “I disapprove of that statistic at all. It’s just not a safe way to compete and it’s not a good way to keep our field general healthy for the rest of the season. We need to play better.”
Allen was sluggish to rise after a tackle in the first half. He said he was OK and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” after he landed on it awkwardly. He was questioned about being hit so frequently during the game.
It's unpleasant,” he said. “I encountered a couple personally. I’ve got to be more effective at disposing of the football. On multiple occasions, I found myself going backwards.”
Allen surrendered 70 yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had 2.5 tackles for loss to lead the Houston defense. Another sack came when he almost took Allen down near the scrimmage line, but he escaped and Anderson got up and pursued him across the field to drop him for an 18-yard loss to force a punt in the third quarter.
The Bills played for a second straight game absent wideout Coleman after he was again a healthy scratch after he was tardy to a team meeting before their previous contest. He was earlier benched for the first series of a loss to New England in Week 5 after also being late for a meeting.
No change. We’re just approaching it day by day,” the coach noted. “I felt he had a better week, but we’re taking it one day at a time. It wasn’t that it wasn’t thought about, but we went with the guys that give us the best chance.”
Khalil Shakir topped the Buffalo with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was frustrated that the team were unable to make plays in crucial moments.
In the end, we must perform, and we failed to do a good job of that this evening,” he said. “No matter the scenario and any condition, we’ve got to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
