Little went well for the Bills' quarterback in a frustrating contest on Thursday evening versus the Houston Texans.
And still he came close to driving the Buffalo Bills to a victory before an interception in the final minute sealed their fate in a 23-19 defeat.
The quarterback took consecutive sacks on the team's last drive, leading to a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (with seven wins) picked up significant yardage on a quick throw from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
Following a pre-snap infraction led to a fourth down situation for the Bills, Calen Bullock picked off Allen’s throw at the 9-yard line with under half a minute left.
“We had a opportunity to come out on top there at the conclusion,” Josh Allen stated. “We did a good job of staying in it and our defense bailed us out a few instances. We must find a way, and unfortunately we failed.”
It was tough for Allen to establish rhythm on a night he was sacked a personal-worst eight times and hit four other times. Allen threw for 253 passing yards with a pair of picks and zero scores after accounting for six touchdowns in a victory over the Buccaneers last week.
“When they hit our quarterback 12 times, I don’t like that,” Bills coach Sean McDermott said. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It’s just not a healthy way to play and it’s not a smart way to preserve our quarterback in good shape for the rest of the season. We need to improve our performance.”
Josh Allen was sluggish to rise after a tackle in the opening two quarters. He indicated he was fine and that his shoulder “lost some feeling” after he landed on it awkwardly. He was questioned about being hit so many times on Thursday.
It's unpleasant,” he remarked. “I ran into a few myself. I’ve got to be more effective at disposing of the football. Too many times, I was going backwards.”
The Bills' QB surrendered 70 yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had 2.5 tackles for loss to top the Texans. His second one came when he almost sacked the QB near the scrimmage line, but he wriggled away and Anderson rose and pursued him downfield to drop him for an 18-yard loss to force a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo competed for a second straight game absent wideout Coleman after he was once more a non-participant after he was tardy to a squad gathering before their previous contest. He was earlier benched for the first series of a defeat to the Patriots in the fifth week after additionally being late for a team session.
“Nothing new. We’re just taking it day by day,” the coach noted. “I felt he had a improved week, but we are handling it step by step. It was not that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the players that provide the best chance.”
Shakir led the Buffalo with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and James Cook had 116 rushing yards and a score.
Allen was disappointed that the team couldn’t execute down the stretch.
In the end, we’ve got execute, and we didn’t do a good job of that this evening,” he concluded. “Whatever scenario and whatever condition, we’ve got to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
