Little went right for the Bills' quarterback in a disappointing contest on Thursday evening against the Houston Texans.
And still he came close to willing the Bills to a win before an interception in the last moments sealed their fate in a 23-19 loss.
The quarterback endured consecutive tackles for loss on the Bills’ final possession, resulting in a long fourth down, but Buffalo (7-4) gained significant yardage on a short pass from Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
After a pre-snap infraction created a fourth-and-6 for Buffalo, a Texans defender picked off the quarterback's throw at the 9-yard line with under half a minute remaining.
We possessed a chance to win it there at the conclusion,” Josh Allen stated. “We did a solid job of hanging tough and our defensive unit bailed us out a couple of times. We must find a way, and unfortunately we failed.”
Proved difficult for Allen to establish rhythm on a evening he was brought down a career-high eight times and pressured four other times. The QB threw for 253 passing yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after accounting for six TDs in a victory over Tampa Bay last week.
Whenever they hit our quarterback 12 times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head 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.”
Josh Allen was slow to get up after a tackle in the opening two quarters. He said he was OK and that his shoulder “lost some feeling” after he landed on it in an awkward manner. He was questioned about being contacted so frequently on Thursday.
It's unpleasant,” he said. “I ran into a few myself. I’ve got to be more effective at disposing of the football. On multiple occasions, I found myself going backwards.”
The Bills' QB surrendered 70 total yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Will Anderson Jr. had two and a half tackles for loss to top the Texans. His second one came when he nearly sacked the QB near the scrimmage line, but he wriggled away and the defender rose and chased him downfield to tackle him for an 18-yard deficit to force a punt in the third quarter.
The Bills competed for a second consecutive matchup without wideout Keon Coleman after he was again a healthy scratch after he was late to a team meeting before their previous contest. He was earlier benched for the opening drive of a loss to New England in the fifth week after additionally being delayed for a team session.
No change. We’re just approaching it day by day,” the coach said. “I thought he had a better week, but we’re handling it step by step. It was not that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the guys that provide the optimal opportunity.”
Khalil Shakir led the Buffalo with eight catches for 110 yards and Cook had 116 yards and a touchdown.
Allen was disappointed that the Bills couldn’t make plays in crucial moments.
“Ultimately, we must perform, and we failed to do a good job of that this evening,” he concluded. “No matter the scenario and whatever condition, we’ve got to discover a solution, and we didn’t.”
