Very little clicked for the Bills' quarterback in a frustrating game Thursday night against the Texans.
And still he came close to driving the Bills to a victory before an interception in the last moments ended their hopes in a 23-19 defeat.
The quarterback endured back-to-back sacks on the Bills’ final possession, resulting in a fourth-and-27, but Buffalo (7-4) picked up significant yardage on a short pass from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a lateral to another teammate.
After a false-start penalty created a fourth down situation for Buffalo, Calen Bullock intercepted Allen’s throw at the Houston 9 with 24 seconds left.
“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 defensive unit bailed us out a couple of times. We’ve got figure it out, and unfortunately we failed.”
It was tough for the signal-caller to establish rhythm on a evening he was sacked a career-high on eight occasions and pressured four additional instances. Allen threw for 253 yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after accounting for six TDs in a victory over Tampa Bay the previous week.
Whenever they pressure our QB 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 safe way to play and it isn't a smart way to preserve our field general healthy for the rest of the season. We need to improve our performance.”
Allen was slow to rise after a sack in the first half. He said he was fine and that his shoulder “lost some feeling” after he fell on it in an awkward manner. He was asked about being contacted so frequently during the game.
It's unpleasant,” he said. “I encountered a few myself. I need to be more effective at throwing the ball away. On multiple occasions, I found myself losing ground.”
The Bills' QB surrendered 70 total yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had two and a half tackles for loss to lead the Texans. His second one occurred when he almost sacked the QB near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and Anderson rose and pursued him across the field to tackle him for an 18-yard deficit to force a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo competed for a second straight game absent wideout Coleman after he was once more a healthy scratch after he was tardy to a squad gathering before their previous contest. He was previously benched for the first series of a defeat to New England in the fifth week after also being delayed for a meeting.
“Nothing new. We are taking it day by day,” McDermott noted. “I thought he had a better week, but we’re taking it step by step. It was not that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the players that give us the optimal opportunity.”
Khalil Shakir topped the Bills with eight catches for 110 yards and James Cook had 116 yards and a score.
The quarterback was disappointed that the team couldn’t make plays down the stretch.
“Ultimately, we’ve got execute, and we failed to do a good job of that tonight,” he concluded. “No matter the scenario and whatever condition, we’ve got to find a way, and we came up short.”
