Very little clicked for Josh Allen in a tough game Thursday night against the Houston Texans.
Yet he came close to willing the Buffalo Bills to a victory before an late pick in the final minute ended their hopes in a close loss.
The quarterback endured consecutive tackles for loss on the Bills’ final possession, resulting in a long fourth down, but the Bills (with seven wins) gained significant yardage on a short pass from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a lateral to another teammate.
Following a pre-snap infraction led to a fourth-and-6 for the Bills, a Texans defender intercepted Allen’s throw at the Houston 9 with under half a minute left.
“We had a opportunity to come out on top there at the end,” Josh Allen said. “Our team performed a good job of hanging tough and our defensive unit saved us a few instances. We’ve got figure it out, and unfortunately we failed.”
Proved difficult for Allen to establish rhythm on a night he was brought down a personal-worst on eight occasions and hit four additional instances. Allen threw for 253 passing yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after producing six touchdowns in a victory over the Buccaneers the previous week.
“When they pressure our quarterback 12 times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott said. “I disapprove of that statistic at all. It’s just not a safe way to compete and it’s not a smart way to preserve our quarterback healthy for the remaining games. We need to improve our performance.”
Allen was sluggish to get up after a sack in the opening two quarters. He said he was OK and that his left shoulder “went a little numb” after he fell on it awkwardly. He was asked about being hit so many times during the game.
“It’s not fun,” he said. “I encountered a couple personally. I need to be more effective at throwing the ball away. Too many times, I found myself losing ground.”
Allen surrendered 70 yards on the eight sacks. Will Anderson Jr. had 2.5 sacks to lead the Texans. His second one occurred when he nearly sacked the QB near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and Anderson got up and chased him across the field to tackle him for an 18-yard loss to result in a punt in the third quarter.
The Bills competed for a second straight game absent wideout Keon Coleman after he was again a non-participant after he was tardy to a squad gathering before their last game. He was earlier benched for the first series of a defeat to the Patriots in Week 5 after also being delayed for a team session.
“Nothing new. We are approaching 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 was not that it was ignored, but we went with the players that give us the optimal opportunity.”
Shakir topped the Bills with eight catches for 110 yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a score.
Allen was disappointed that the Bills were unable to make plays in crucial moments.
In the end, we must perform, and we didn’t do a good job of that this evening,” he said. “No matter the situation and whatever circumstance, we need to find a way, and we came up short.”
