Little went well for Josh Allen in a disappointing contest on Thursday evening versus the Texans.
And still he came close to driving the Bills to a victory before an late pick in the last moments sealed their fate in a close defeat.
Allen took back-to-back tackles for loss on the Bills’ last drive, resulting in a fourth-and-27, but Buffalo (7-4) gained significant yardage on a short pass from Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a lateral to Khalil Shakir.
After a false-start penalty created a fourth down situation for Buffalo, Calen Bullock picked off Allen’s throw at the 9-yard line with under half a minute remaining.
We possessed a chance to come out on top there at the conclusion,” Josh Allen said. “We did a good job of staying in it and our defensive unit bailed us out a few instances. We’ve got figure it out, and we didn’t.”
Proved tough for Allen to get anything going on a evening he was brought down a personal-worst on eight occasions and pressured four additional instances. The QB threw for 253 passing yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after producing six TDs in a victory over Tampa Bay last week.
“When they pressure our quarterback 12 times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott said. “I disapprove of that stat at all. It’s just not a healthy way to compete and it isn't a smart way to preserve our quarterback in good shape for the rest of the season. We need to play better.”
Allen was slow to get up after a tackle in the first half. He indicated he was OK and that his left shoulder “went a little numb” after he landed on it in an awkward manner. He was asked about being contacted so frequently on Thursday.
It's unpleasant,” he said. “I ran into a couple personally. I’ve got to be more effective at disposing of the football. On multiple occasions, I was going backwards.”
The Bills' QB lost 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had 2.5 tackles for loss to top the Texans. Another sack came when he almost took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and Anderson got up and pursued him downfield to tackle him for an 18-yard loss to result in a punt in the third quarter.
The Bills played for a second consecutive matchup without receiver Coleman after he was once more a healthy scratch after he was late to a team meeting before their previous contest. He was earlier benched for the opening drive of a defeat to New England in Week 5 after additionally being delayed for a meeting.
“Nothing new. We’re just approaching it one day at a time,” McDermott said. “I felt he had a better week, but we are 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.”
Shakir topped the Bills with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and James Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was disappointed that the Bills were unable to execute in crucial moments.
“Ultimately, we must perform, and we failed to succeed of that this evening,” he concluded. “Whatever situation and any circumstance, we need to find a way, and we came up short.”
