Very little went well for the Bills' quarterback in a disappointing game Thursday night against the Houston Texans.
Yet he came close to driving the Buffalo Bills to a win before an late pick in the last moments ended their hopes in a close loss.
Allen took consecutive sacks on the team's last drive, resulting in a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (7-4) picked up significant yardage on a quick throw from Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a backward pass to another teammate.
After a pre-snap infraction created a fourth-and-6 for Buffalo, Calen Bullock intercepted the quarterback's throw at the Houston 9 with under half a minute remaining.
“We had a opportunity to come out on top there at the end,” 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 figure it out, and we didn’t.”
It was tough for the signal-caller to establish rhythm on a evening he was brought down a career-high eight times and pressured four additional instances. The QB passed for 253 yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after accounting for six TDs in a victory over the Buccaneers last week.
Whenever they pressure our QB a dozen times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach McDermott commented. “I disapprove of that stat at all. It is not a healthy way to play and it’s not a smart way to keep our field general healthy for the rest of the season. We’ve got to improve our performance.”
Allen was sluggish to rise after a sack in the opening two quarters. He indicated he was OK and that his shoulder “went a little numb” after he fell on it awkwardly. He was questioned about being hit so frequently on Thursday.
“It’s not fun,” he remarked. “I encountered a few personally. I’ve got to be better at disposing of the football. Too many times, I found myself losing ground.”
Allen lost 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Will Anderson Jr. had 2.5 sacks to lead the Houston defense. His second one occurred when he nearly took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and Anderson got up and pursued him across the field to tackle him for an 18-yard loss to result in a punt early in the third.
Buffalo competed for a second consecutive matchup absent wideout Coleman after he was again a non-participant after he was tardy to a squad gathering before their previous contest. He was previously held out for the opening drive of a loss to New England in Week 5 after additionally being late for a meeting.
No change. We are taking it day by day,” the coach said. “I felt he had a better week, but we’re handling it one day at a time. It was not that it wasn’t thought about, but we went with the players that provide the best chance.”
Shakir led the Bills with eight catches for 110 yards and James Cook had 116 rushing yards and a score.
Allen was frustrated that the Bills couldn’t execute in crucial moments.
In the end, we must perform, and we failed to do a good job of that this evening,” he concluded. “No matter the scenario and any circumstance, we need to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
