Little went well for the Bills' quarterback in a disappointing contest on Thursday evening against the Texans.
And still he came close to driving the Bills to a victory before an interception in the final minute sealed their fate in a 23-19 defeat.
The quarterback endured back-to-back sacks on the Bills’ final possession, leading to a long fourth down, but Buffalo (with seven wins) picked up significant yardage on a short pass from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a lateral to Khalil Shakir.
Following a pre-snap infraction created a fourth-and-6 for the Bills, a Texans defender intercepted Allen’s pass at the 9-yard line with 24 seconds remaining.
We possessed a chance to come out on top there at the conclusion,” Josh Allen said. “Our team performed a solid job of hanging tough and our defense saved us a couple of times. We’ve got find a way, and unfortunately we failed.”
Proved difficult for the signal-caller to get anything going on a night he was brought down a career-high on eight occasions and pressured four other times. The QB passed for 253 yards with a pair of picks and zero scores after accounting for six touchdowns in a victory over the Buccaneers last week.
“When they pressure our quarterback a dozen times, that's unacceptable,” Bills coach McDermott commented. “I don’t like that stat at all. It’s just not a healthy way to compete and it isn't a smart way to preserve our field general in good shape for the rest of the season. We’ve got to play better.”
Josh Allen was slow to rise after a tackle in the first half. He indicated he was OK and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” after he fell on it awkwardly. He was asked about being contacted so frequently on Thursday.
It's unpleasant,” he remarked. “I encountered a few myself. I need to be more effective at throwing the ball away. On multiple occasions, I was going backwards.”
The Bills' QB surrendered 70 total yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had two and a half sacks to top the Houston defense. His second one occurred when he nearly sacked the QB near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and Anderson got up and chased him downfield to tackle him for an 18-yard deficit to result in a punt in the third quarter.
The Bills competed for a second straight game absent wideout Keon Coleman after he was again a non-participant after he was late to a team meeting before their last game. He was previously held out for the opening drive of a defeat to the Patriots in Week 5 after also being late for a team session.
“Nothing new. We’re just taking it day by day,” the coach said. “I felt he had a better week, but we’re taking it one day at a time. It wasn’t that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the guys that provide the best chance.”
Shakir led the Buffalo with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and James Cook had 116 rushing yards and a score.
The quarterback was disappointed that the team couldn’t execute down the stretch.
In the end, we’ve got perform, and we didn’t do a good job of that tonight,” he concluded. “No matter the situation and any condition, we’ve got to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
