Very little went well for Josh Allen in a disappointing contest on Thursday evening against the Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to driving the Buffalo Bills to a victory before an interception in the final minute ended their hopes in a close defeat.
The quarterback endured consecutive sacks on the Bills’ final possession, leading to a fourth-and-27, but Buffalo (with seven wins) gained 44 yards on a quick throw from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
After a false-start penalty created a fourth down situation for the Bills, Calen Bullock intercepted Allen’s pass at the 9-yard line with under half a minute left.
“We had a chance to win it there at the end,” Josh Allen said. “We did a good job of hanging tough and our defense bailed us out a couple of times. We must figure it out, and we didn’t.”
Proved difficult for the signal-caller to establish rhythm on a evening he was sacked a career-high eight times and pressured four additional instances. Allen passed for 253 passing yards with two interceptions and zero scores after producing six TDs in a victory over the Buccaneers last week.
“When they hit our QB a dozen times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott commented. “I disapprove of that statistic at all. It is not a healthy way to play and it’s not a good way to preserve our field general healthy for the remaining games. We’ve got to improve our performance.”
Josh Allen was sluggish to rise after a tackle in the opening two quarters. He said he was OK and that his shoulder “went a little numb” after he landed on it in an awkward manner. He was questioned about being contacted so frequently on Thursday.
“It’s not fun,” he said. “I encountered a few personally. I need to be more effective at throwing the ball away. On multiple occasions, I found myself going backwards.”
The Bills' QB lost 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had two and a half sacks to lead the Houston defense. Another sack occurred when he almost took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and the defender rose and pursued him downfield to drop him for an 18-yard loss to result in a punt early in the third.
The Bills competed for a second consecutive matchup absent wideout Keon Coleman after he was again a healthy scratch after he was late to a squad gathering before their previous contest. He was earlier held out for the opening drive of a loss to New England in the fifth week after additionally being delayed for a meeting.
“Nothing new. We are approaching it day by day,” the coach noted. “I felt he had a improved week, but we are taking it one day at a time. It was not that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the players that give us the best chance.”
Shakir led the Bills with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was frustrated that the team were unable to execute in crucial moments.
“Ultimately, we must perform, and we didn’t do a good job of that this evening,” he concluded. “No matter the scenario and whatever condition, we need to find a way, and we came up short.”
