Josh Allen and the Buffalo Bills suffered an incredibly disappointing loss on Thursday Night Football to the Houston Texans to kick off Week 12 NFL action. With the loss, the team dropped to 7-4 on the season.
As has been the case in multiple different moments this season, the Bills’ Super Bowl hopes have been called into question.
Plenty of flaws have been seen in the Buffalo roster. Despite the concerns, the Bills are still a top-tier contender at this point. However, they will need to fix the issues that have been clearly shown to be present.
One of those issues was extremely clear against the Texans. Allen was under pressure all game long. When all was said and done, he was sacked eight times and was hit on 12 total occasions.
Following the game, head coach Sean McDermott spoke out honestly about a major concern about Allen. He understands that the superstar quarterback cannot continue taking so many hits if the team wants to keep him healthy.
"They had 12 hits on Josh, eight sacks. That's not a healthy formula right there," McDermott said. "It's not a healthy way to play or a healthy way to keep our quarterback healthy through the remainder of the season."
He continued on, offering that one fix to the problem is that Buffalo needs to stop putting itself in a position for clear passing downs.
"That's where the hits come, second down and long turns into third down and long, and that's the unhealthy formula I'm talking about, and Josh takes too many hits. So we've got to figure that piece out," McDermott said.
McDermott is 100 percent right. Allen will not be able to remain healthy being sacked eight times in a game and being hit 12 times. That also isn’t a recipe for a Super Bowl run.
Thankfully, there is time for the Bills to figure out their issues before the playoffs arrive. Unfortunately, adding reinforcements likely won’t be much of an option. Buffalo will have to improve from within.
Next up for the Bills will be a tough Week 13 matchup on the road against the Pittsburgh Steelers. Buffalo will face off against a Steelers defense led by T.J. Watt, who will be looking to place even more punishment on Allen.
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