Little went right for the Bills' quarterback in a frustrating game Thursday night against the Texans.
And still he came close to willing the Buffalo Bills to a win before an late pick in the final minute sealed their fate in a 23-19 defeat.
Allen took back-to-back tackles for loss on the team's final possession, leading to a long fourth down, but the Bills (7-4) picked up significant yardage on a quick throw from Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
Following a false-start penalty created a fourth-and-6 for the Bills, a Texans defender picked off the quarterback's pass at the Houston 9 with under half a minute left.
We possessed a chance to win it there at the end,” Josh Allen stated. “Our team performed a solid job of staying in it and our defensive unit bailed us out a couple of times. We must figure it out, and we didn’t.”
It was tough for Allen to get anything going on a evening he was sacked a personal-worst on eight occasions and pressured four additional instances. Allen threw for 253 passing yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after producing six touchdowns in a win over Tampa Bay last week.
Whenever they pressure our QB 12 times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott said. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It is not a healthy way to compete and it isn't a smart way to preserve our quarterback in good shape for the remaining games. We need to play better.”
Josh Allen was slow to get up after a tackle in the first half. He indicated he was OK and that his shoulder “went a little numb” after he fell on it in an awkward manner. He was questioned about being hit so frequently during the game.
“It’s not fun,” he said. “I ran into a couple myself. I need to be better at throwing the ball away. Too many times, I found myself losing ground.”
Allen lost 70 total yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had two and a half sacks to top the Houston defense. His second one occurred when he almost took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and Anderson rose and chased him downfield to drop him for an 18-yard loss to result in a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo competed for a second straight game absent receiver Keon Coleman after he was again a non-participant after he was tardy to a squad gathering before their previous contest. He was earlier benched for the opening drive of a defeat to New England in Week 5 after additionally being late for a team session.
No change. We are taking it one day at a time,” McDermott noted. “I thought he had a improved 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 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.
The quarterback was disappointed that the team couldn’t execute in crucial moments.
In the end, we must perform, and we didn’t succeed of that this evening,” he concluded. “No matter the scenario and any circumstance, we’ve got to find a way, and we came up short.”
