Little went right for the Bills' quarterback in a disappointing game on Thursday evening against the Houston Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to driving the Buffalo Bills to a win before an late pick in the final minute ended their hopes in a 23-19 loss.
The quarterback took back-to-back sacks on the team's last drive, resulting in a long fourth down, but the Bills (with seven wins) picked up significant yardage on a short pass from Allen to a receiver, who tossed a backward pass to another teammate.
After a false-start penalty led to a fourth down situation for Buffalo, a Texans defender picked off Allen’s pass at the Houston 9 with under half a minute remaining.
We possessed a opportunity to come out on top there at the conclusion,” Josh Allen stated. “We did a good job of hanging tough and our defense bailed us out a couple of times. We’ve got figure it out, and unfortunately we failed.”
It was difficult for the signal-caller to establish rhythm on a evening he was brought down a career-high on eight occasions and pressured four other times. Allen threw 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 a dozen times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott commented. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It’s just not a safe way to compete and it isn't a smart way to preserve our quarterback healthy for the rest of the season. We need to play better.”
Allen was sluggish to rise after a tackle in the first half. He said he was OK and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” after he fell on it in an awkward manner. He was asked about being contacted so many times on Thursday.
“It’s not fun,” he said. “I ran into a few myself. I’ve got to be better at throwing the ball away. On multiple occasions, I was losing ground.”
Allen surrendered 70 total yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had 2.5 sacks to lead the Texans. Another sack occurred when he almost took Allen down near the scrimmage line, but he wriggled away and the defender rose and chased him across the field to tackle him for an 18-yard loss to force a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo competed for a second consecutive matchup without receiver Coleman after he was again a non-participant after he was tardy to a squad gathering before their last game. He was previously benched for the first series of a defeat to New England in Week 5 after additionally being late for a meeting.
No change. We’re just approaching it day by day,” McDermott said. “I felt he had a improved week, but we are taking it one day at a time. It wasn’t that it was ignored, but we opted for the guys that provide the best chance.”
Khalil Shakir led the Buffalo with eight catches for 110 yards and James Cook had 116 yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was frustrated that the Bills couldn’t make plays in crucial moments.
In the end, we’ve got execute, and we didn’t do a good job of that this evening,” he said. “No matter the scenario and whatever condition, we’ve got to find a way, and we came up short.”
