Buffalo’s pro sports fans have long had an inferiority complex.
Their language is peppered with phrases from the city’s ignominious playoff history: Wide Right, No Goal, Music City Miracle …
But another such chapter certainly wasn’t going to be written Saturday at Houston’s NRG Stadium.
After all, here were the Bills, who hadn’t won a playoff game since the 1995 campaign and playing in the postseason for only the second time in two decades, in complete control.
Buffalo was up 16-0 on the home-standing Texans late in the third quarter. It was a two-possession lead with an asterisk … not only would Houston have to score two touchdowns, it would also need a pair of two-point conversions just to tie it.
Surely, one of the National Football League’s top defenses could hold that margin for barely a single period.
Ahhh, not so much.
Instead, in a span of 12 minutes, the Texans parlayed that exact combination, plus a field goal, into a three-point lead. To their credit, the Bills conjured a clutch 47-yard answer — the exact length of Scott Norwood’s miss in Super Bowl XXV’s ‘Wide Right’ — from Stephen Hauschka to produce overtime.
But that merely set up another heartbreaking finish for a Buffalo pro sports team. Houston, behind a spectacular play from quarterback Deshaun Watson to former Bills running back Taiwan Jones, set up the chip-shot field goal that produced a 22-19 Texans victory.
It’s hard to imagine coach Bill O’Brien’s inconsistent team going to Kansas City and beating the Chiefs … but the Bills surely would have savored that opportunity.
Instead, Buffalo will have to live with yet another galling playoff defeat for years to come.
But there’s a much more immediate impact from this painful loss, as in, where do the Bills stand at quarterback?
Coach Sean McDermott and general manager Brandon Beane are all in on Josh Allen … indeed, in some ways, they staked their futures on him.
To be sure, since McDermott was hired the draft selections of cornerback Tre’Davious White, tackle Dion Dawkins and linebacker Matt Milano in 2017 have worked out (Beane was not yet on staff for those picks) as have linebacker Tremaine Edmunds, defensive tackle Harrison Phillips and cornerback Taron Johnson a year later.
But it was Allen, for whom the Bills traded first-round draft positions with Tampa Bay (from 12th to 7th) plus sending two second-round choices to the Bucs, who was supposed to be the make-or-break selection in 2018.
Buffalo needed a “franchise quarterback” and, after two seasons, we have no idea whether Allen is it. Indeed, following his incredibly uneven performance on Saturday, the answer could well be “He isn’t.”
In the first quarter at Houston, it seemed the opposite. Allen unleashed a 42-yard run, longest by a Buffalo QB in franchise playoff history. Immediately thereafter, he caught a 16-yard touchdown pass from wide receiver John Brown on a gimmick play.
But the Bills wouldn’t score another TD in the game’s final 60 minutes and Allen’s play began to decline in two ways.
First is his persistent lack of respect for protecting the football and second is his penchant for horrendous decision-making.
Allen’s apologists point to the fact he has thrown only two interceptions in the past dozen games. But against Houston, cornerback Bradley Roby dropped not one, but two picks. And there might have been a third opportunity had defensive end J.J. Watt been able to close his upraised arms fast enough as an Allen throw passed between them.
But it’s fumbles where Allen shows his real vulnerability. In 17 games this season, he’s fumbled 16 times, losing five. On Saturday, his first fumble was recovered by Houston and turned into a score during the comeback. His second was a bizarre, ill-considered lateral to tight end Dawson Knox that fortuitously wasn’t ruled “forward.” A third possible fumble was erased on video review as Allen’s knee was down a fraction of a second before he lost the ball with the Texans recovering.
Then there were his “decisions,” aside from the ridiculous lateral.
Late in regulation, with the Bills in field goal position to tie at Houston’s 28, Allen lost 41 yards on consecutive snaps via an intentional grounding and a sack, two mortal sins for a QB when trailing with time running out.
The point is this, Allen, after every bad game, repeats ad nauseum, “I’ll learn from it.” But he hasn’t, continually repeating his carelessness with the ball and flawed decision-making.
McDermott and Beane have to be uneasy about the fallout from Allen’s part in losing a playoff game that Buffalo should have won. But if they quit on him, it’s admitting they erred on an expensive first round draft pick.
Yeah, he was one of two 2018 opening-round quarterback draft selections to make the playoffs — Baltimore’s Lamar Jackson was the other — while Sam Darnold (Jets), Josh Rosen (Dolphins) and Baker Mayfield (Browns) stayed home. But Buffalo didn’t make the postseason because of Allen, its defense gets most of the credit.
To be fair, the Bills’ quarterback was only partially responsible for this depressing defeat.
McDermott’s repeated mishandling of the clock this season was a factor again and, equally as hurtful, as well as the defense has played this season, Buffalo’s sloppy tackling in the late going finally came back to cost a game.
Linebacker Matt Milano and safety Siran Neal seemingly had Watson lined up to be sacked for the eighth time, but appeared to collide as they tried to grab him with the QB stepping free and finding Jones for a 34-yard connection that set up the game-winning field goal.
That was four plays after the Bills couldn’t stop running back Duke Johnson from converting a 3rd-and-18 on a reception.
What could/should have been a celebration of a win that lifted Buffalo into the AFC elite and closer to the faltering Patriots instead became a disastrous loss that raised some major questions — starting at quarterback — heading into the 2020 season.
As White, the All-Pro, lamented of the blown victory, “It’s going to haunt us, for sure, in the offseason…”
(Chuck Pollock, a Times Herald senior sports columnist, can be reached at cpollock@oleantimesherald.com)
