Very little went right for the Bills' quarterback in a disappointing contest Thursday night against the Texans.
And still he nearly managed to willing the Buffalo Bills to a win before an interception in the last moments ended their hopes in a 23-19 loss.
Allen endured consecutive tackles for loss on the Bills’ final possession, leading to a fourth-and-27, but Buffalo (with seven wins) picked up 44 yards on a quick throw from Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
After a pre-snap infraction led to a fourth down situation for Buffalo, Calen Bullock intercepted Allen’s pass at the Houston 9 with 24 seconds left.
We possessed a chance to come out on top there at the end,” Josh Allen said. “Our team performed a solid job of staying in it and our defensive unit saved us a few instances. We must find a way, and unfortunately we failed.”
Proved difficult for Allen to establish rhythm on a evening he was brought down a career-high eight times and hit four other times. The QB threw for 253 yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after accounting for six touchdowns in a victory over the Buccaneers the previous week.
“When they pressure our QB a dozen times, that's unacceptable,” Bills coach Sean McDermott said. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It’s just not a safe way to compete and it isn't a smart way to keep our field general healthy for the remaining games. We’ve got to improve our performance.”
Allen was slow to get up after a sack in the first half. He said he was fine and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” 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 few personally. I’ve got to be better at throwing the ball away. On multiple occasions, I was going backwards.”
Allen lost 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 sacked the QB near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and Anderson rose and pursued him downfield to drop him for an 18-yard loss to force a punt early in the third.
Buffalo competed for a second straight game absent receiver Coleman after he was once more a non-participant after he was tardy to a team meeting before their last game. He was earlier benched for the opening drive of a loss to the Patriots in the fifth week 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 are handling it one day at a time. It wasn’t that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the players that give us the optimal opportunity.”
Khalil Shakir topped the Buffalo with eight receptions for 110 yards and James Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was disappointed that the team couldn’t make plays in crucial moments.
In the end, we must perform, and we didn’t succeed of that this evening,” he said. “No matter the situation and whatever condition, we need to discover a solution, and we didn’t.”
