Very little went right for the Bills' quarterback in a frustrating contest on Thursday evening against the Texans.
Yet he came close to driving the Buffalo Bills to a win before an late pick in the final minute sealed their fate in a close defeat.
The quarterback took consecutive tackles for loss on the team's last drive, leading to a fourth-and-27, but Buffalo (7-4) picked up significant yardage on a quick throw from Allen to a receiver, who tossed a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
After a pre-snap infraction led to a fourth down situation for Buffalo, a Texans defender intercepted the quarterback's pass at the Houston 9 with under half a minute left.
“We had a chance to come out on top there at the end,” Josh Allen stated. “Our team performed a solid job of staying in it and our defense saved us a couple of times. We must figure it out, and we didn’t.”
It was difficult for Allen to get anything going on a evening he was brought down a personal-worst on eight occasions and pressured four other times. Allen passed for 253 passing yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns after producing six TDs in a win over the Buccaneers last week.
Whenever they hit our quarterback a dozen times, that's unacceptable,” Bills coach Sean McDermott commented. “I disapprove of that statistic at all. It’s just not a safe way to play and it’s not a good way to keep our quarterback in good shape for the remaining games. We need to play better.”
Allen was slow to rise after a tackle in the opening two quarters. He said he was fine and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” after he fell on it awkwardly. He was asked about being hit so many times on Thursday.
“It’s not fun,” he said. “I ran into a few myself. I’ve got to be more effective at disposing of the football. Too many times, I found myself going backwards.”
The Bills' QB lost 70 yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Will Anderson Jr. had two and a half tackles for loss to top the Texans. Another sack occurred 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 force a punt early in the third.
The Bills played for a second straight game absent receiver Keon Coleman after he was again a non-participant after he was tardy to a team meeting before their previous contest. He was previously held out for the first series of a defeat to New England in Week 5 after also being late for a meeting.
No change. We’re just approaching it day by day,” McDermott noted. “I felt he had a improved week, but we are handling it one day at a time. It was not that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the guys that give us the optimal opportunity.”
Shakir led the Bills with eight receptions for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a score.
Allen was frustrated that the team couldn’t execute in crucial moments.
In the end, we’ve got execute, and we didn’t do a good job of that this evening,” he concluded. “No matter the scenario and any circumstance, we’ve got to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
