Very little went right for the Bills' quarterback in a disappointing game on Thursday evening versus the Houston Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to driving the Bills to a win before an late pick in the final minute ended their hopes in a close defeat.
The quarterback endured consecutive tackles for loss on the team's last drive, resulting in a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (with seven wins) picked up 44 yards on a short pass from Allen to a receiver, who flipped a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
After a false-start penalty led to a fourth down situation for the Bills, a Texans defender picked off the quarterback's pass at the 9-yard line with under half a minute remaining.
“We had a chance to win it there at the conclusion,” Josh Allen stated. “Our team performed a solid job of hanging tough and our defense bailed us out a few instances. We’ve got find a way, and unfortunately we failed.”
Proved tough for the signal-caller to establish rhythm on a evening he was brought down 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 producing six TDs in a victory over the Buccaneers the previous week.
Whenever they pressure our quarterback 12 times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott said. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It’s just not a safe way to compete and it’s not a smart way to preserve our quarterback in good shape for the remaining games. We need to improve our performance.”
Josh Allen was sluggish to get up after a tackle in the first half. He said he was OK and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” after he landed on it in an awkward manner. He was questioned about being contacted so frequently during the game.
“It’s not fun,” he said. “I encountered a couple personally. I need to be better at disposing of the football. Too many times, I was losing ground.”
The Bills' QB surrendered 70 yards on the eight sacks. Will Anderson Jr. had 2.5 tackles for loss to top the Houston defense. Another sack came when he nearly sacked the QB near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and Anderson rose and pursued him downfield to tackle 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 late to a squad gathering before their previous contest. He was previously held out for the first series of a defeat to New England in Week 5 after additionally being late for a team session.
“Nothing new. We are approaching it day by day,” the coach noted. “I thought he had a better week, but we are taking it one day at a time. It wasn’t that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the players that provide the optimal opportunity.”
Shakir topped the Bills with eight receptions for 110 yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was disappointed that the team couldn’t execute down the stretch.
“Ultimately, we’ve got perform, and we didn’t do a good job of that tonight,” he said. “No matter the scenario and any condition, we need to find a way, and we didn’t.”
