Little went well for the Bills' quarterback in a disappointing game on Thursday evening versus the Houston Texans.
Yet he came close to driving the Bills to a victory before an late pick in the final minute ended their hopes in a close defeat.
Allen took back-to-back tackles for loss on the team's last drive, resulting in a fourth-and-27, but Buffalo (with seven wins) gained 44 yards on a short pass from Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
After a pre-snap infraction led to a fourth down situation for the Bills, a Texans defender intercepted the quarterback's throw at the 9-yard line with under half a minute left.
“We had a chance to come out on top there at the end,” Josh Allen said. “Our team performed a good job of staying in it and our defensive unit bailed us out a few instances. We’ve got find a way, and unfortunately we failed.”
Proved 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. The QB passed for 253 passing yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns after accounting for six TDs in a win over Tampa Bay last week.
“When they pressure our quarterback 12 times, that's unacceptable,” Bills coach McDermott said. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It’s just not a healthy way to play and it’s not a smart way to keep our quarterback healthy for the rest of the season. We need to improve our performance.”
Josh Allen was sluggish to get up after a tackle in the first half. He indicated he was fine and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” after he fell on it awkwardly. He was asked about being contacted so many times during the game.
“It’s not fun,” he remarked. “I encountered a few myself. I’ve got to be more effective at throwing the ball away. Too many times, I found myself going backwards.”
The Bills' QB surrendered 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had two and a half tackles for loss to lead the Houston defense. Another sack came when he nearly sacked the QB near the scrimmage line, but he wriggled away and Anderson got up and pursued him downfield to drop him for an 18-yard deficit to force a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo competed for a second straight game absent receiver Coleman after he was once more a healthy scratch after he was tardy to a team meeting before their last game. He was earlier held out for the first series of a loss to the Patriots in Week 5 after additionally being late for a meeting.
“Nothing new. We are approaching it day by day,” McDermott noted. “I thought he had a improved week, but we’re handling it one day at a time. It was not that it was ignored, but we opted for the guys that provide the optimal opportunity.”
Shakir topped the Buffalo with eight receptions for 110 receiving yards and James Cook had 116 yards and a score.
The quarterback was disappointed that the team 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 concluded. “No matter the scenario and whatever circumstance, we need to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
