Very little clicked for Josh Allen in a disappointing game on Thursday evening versus the Houston Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to willing the Buffalo Bills to a win before an interception in the final minute sealed their fate in a close defeat.
Allen took back-to-back tackles for loss on the team's final possession, leading to a fourth-and-27, but Buffalo (with seven wins) picked up 44 yards on a quick throw from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
Following a false-start penalty created a fourth down situation for Buffalo, Calen Bullock picked off Allen’s pass at the 9-yard line with under half a minute left.
We possessed a chance to come out on top there at the conclusion,” Josh Allen said. “Our team performed a good job of staying in it and our defense bailed us out a few instances. We must figure it out, and unfortunately we failed.”
Proved difficult for the signal-caller to get anything going on a evening he was sacked a career-high eight times and pressured four other times. The QB threw for 253 yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns after accounting for six touchdowns in a win over Tampa Bay last week.
Whenever they pressure our QB 12 times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach McDermott commented. “I disapprove of that statistic at all. It’s just not a healthy way to play and it’s not a smart way to keep our field general healthy for the rest of the season. We need to play better.”
Josh Allen was slow to get up after a tackle in the opening two quarters. He indicated he was OK and that his shoulder “went a little numb” after he landed on it in an awkward manner. He was questioned about being contacted so many times on Thursday.
“It’s not fun,” he said. “I ran into a few personally. I need to be more effective at disposing of the football. Too many times, I was going backwards.”
The Bills' QB surrendered 70 total yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had two and a half sacks to lead the Houston defense. His second one occurred when he nearly took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and Anderson rose and pursued him across the field to tackle him for an 18-yard loss to force a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo competed for a second consecutive matchup absent wideout Keon Coleman after he was once more a healthy scratch after he was late to a team meeting before their last game. He was earlier held out for the opening drive of a loss to New England in the fifth week after also being late for a team session.
“Nothing new. We are approaching it one day at a time,” McDermott noted. “I felt he had a better week, but we’re handling it step by step. It was not that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the guys that give us the best chance.”
Khalil Shakir led the Bills with eight receptions for 110 yards and Cook had 116 yards and a touchdown.
Allen was disappointed that the Bills were unable to make plays down the stretch.
“Ultimately, we must execute, and we didn’t succeed of that tonight,” he concluded. “No matter the scenario and whatever circumstance, we need to discover a solution, and we didn’t.”
