CincyBillsFan

You're not the first poster to make this observation but it doesn't reflect yesterday's game: * Allen made a number of short throws to move the sticks. Allen & the Bills converted 50% of their first downs. which isn't bad. In fact even when Buffalo didn't score they often moved the ball boosting their field position and giving the defense a breather. * The numbers don't lie and the Bills had 24 first downs to the Jets 15; and the Bills had 33:47 minutes of TOP compared to just 26:13 for the Jets. The Bills also out gained the Jets 368 yards to 248 yards. The problem is that the Bills were not as good as the Jets in the red zone. This IMO is a result of their lack of weapons. As the field shrinks this is exposed in the red zone.

Living down here in Cincinnati I'm fortunately spared the piss poor "expert" coverage of the Western NY sports media. Reading the stories this morning on the news feed here at Two Bills Drive was enough to make me nauseous. To be clear, I expect fair and constructive criticism of this team - particularly the QB. But the stuff I read this morning was over the top! There were a lot of reasons the Bills lost yesterday but Allen regressing was about 5th on the list. These writers/reporters pay lip service to all the holes in the Bills offense, from the O-line to the absence of any skill player who strikes fear in the opposing team but they don't take the time to add up 2 + 2 = 4. They cry about Allen and his horrible passing as if he's playing QB in isolation. The reason Allen struggled AT TIMES yesterday in the passing game had more to do with the surrounding talent then Allen. Sure Allen had a terrible throw on his 1st INT but his second INT was a pedestrian NFL play in which the QB is picked off late in the game. You see that kind of INT multiple times ALMOST EVERY FREAKING WEEK in the NFL. Last night the Bears defense was all over the Rams and Goof threw 3 bad INT's. That's what happens when the pass rush is all over your QB. Throw in the other clear deficiencies and it's a wonder the Bills generated enough offense to be in a position to win the game. I get that we fans are going to be crazy at times. Our expectations will go up and down like a balloon - soaring after a good game and being deflated after a poor game. We're fans that's what we do. But what's the excuse for these guys? They are paid "professionals" and frankly I think the average poster on two Bills Drive offers more accurate insight then the whole lot of the Western New York sports writers. And while I'm on my rant, some of these sports writers are the most pessimistic people I have ever seen. My goodness they're like that cartoon character with the cloud hanging over his head. I don't want cheer leading about Allen from these guys but what we get instead is the polar opposite which is much worse.

The recent polls would support this 100%.

Okay, we've now gone from the ball being at his ankle to his knees and now just below his waist. Talk about ball movement! The pass was very well thrown and should have been caught for a 25 - 30 yard gain.

Serious question 26CornerBlitz do you buy into this statement describing today's game? To me it's a lazy review. For sure this was not a good passing effort by Allen but he had way to many good throws today to warrant a comment that seems to be saying he can't throw the ball. And to not throw in the abysmal pass protection and multiple drops in describing Allen's game is just plain wrong. Reading this little blurb would lead someone who didn't watch the game to place all the blame on Allen for the Bills losing. And calling that last INT "devastating" is a bit over the top and seems like a comment a drama queen might make. Look, I'm fine with fair criticism of Allen's play today. And for me, given all the circumstances, that mainly revolves around his poor ball protection. The 3 TO's were bad. But you can't ignore the other factors involving the Bills RB, O-Line, TE and WR play that contributed to the loss. Given the TOTAL effort by the offense today Allen played an okay game. Oh and as I post this, I just saw Goff throw his 3rd INT right after Turbisky threw his 3rd pick.

Thanks for that as I was beginning to wonder if I had lost it. I was watching the game with the grand kids and after Clay's drop of what looked to me to be a very well thrown pass I had to refrain from teaching the kids some new words.

There was a nice touch pass to one of the RB's out of the backfield. A couple of his shorter sideline throws had nice touch as well. He had one dead duck of a throw that he tried to make to a RB standing 5 yards away from him. This is what we'll have to learn to live with - 1 or 2 of these types of throws. The trade off will be a couple of 20 yard runs on 3rd & 10.

That's not how I saw it. The ball was above the knees and hit Clay in stride. In the NFL 99% of the time that pass is caught and huge YAC play is made.

Funny how after 3 games in a row they havn't figured it out yet. What I'm curious about is given the lack of weapons we have around Allen, why haven't defenses been able to shut his rushing game down? Is it because they're terrified that Clay will beat them deep down the middle? He made several nice touch throws today.

I must have been watching a different game because it seemed to me Allen hit Clay in the hands at stomach level. There was NO WAY that pass was at his ankles. I guess we'll have to wait for the 23 & me review to tell for sure. But it looked like a perfectly thrown ball to me.

What choice does he have, especially today? * They were down to their 3rd string RB and after Shady there isn't a reliable pass catching RB on this team, something that is a staple on almost every other NFL team. Throw in the issue with the back-up RB's recognizing and blocking the blitz and sandlot is all you got. * Does Buffalo have a single NFL caliber TE? I was watching the halftime highlights today and I see Tampa Bay's TE make a great TD catch; ditto for Gronk and the KC TE. I mean to try to run an NFL offense without a play making (or even reliable) TE is almost impossible. * Sandlot is the only option when it's a jail break to the QB the moment the ball is snapped. I could go on but Is suspect folks get what I'm cooking here.

He absolutely is our QB. I look forward to the day when we can see the numbers he puts up with truly dangerous WR's; decent TE's and an O-line that allows him to sit in the pocket. Once Shady went down we lost any semblance of a receiving threat from our RB's. Throw in the fact that we have the worst TE situation in the NFL and it's a miracle we can even move the ball. Think about the play on 2nd & 20 where Allen hit McKenzie with a 10 yard strike that #19 then turned and added 8 yards of YAK. How often this season have we seen Bill's receivers (TE's & WR's) give us decent YAC? Compared to other teams almost never. Or remember the pass to Clay that he dropped over the middle? Perfect throw to hit Clay on the run and he drops it. Would that have been a 25 yard play had he caught it? That drop on our 2nd possession put us in a 3rd & 7 and when Allen tried to run he lost the fumble and the Jet's got a FG. Make that catch and the Bills are in Jet's territory on the way to possibly going up 14 - 0.

If the criticism is legitimate I can except it. But do you really believe Allen's bad INT was a LOT worse then Darnolds? Sure Allen had 3 TO's today and he must do better to protect the ball but Darnold had a throw that 9 times out of 10 would have either been a pick 6 or a huge INT return. That it was dropped doesn't absolve Darnold of a bad throw. IMO Allen & Darnold had a similar passing game. They each had a terrible INT; they both made several excellent throws; and they both made big throws in driving their teams down the field at the end of the game. IMO Shook was to positive on Darnold and to negative on Allen. I also disagree with Shook's characterization that Allen's running is not sustainable. I think it is with only a slight down shift in the number of carries per game. With respect to this game I thought Shook was disingenuous to throw out his critique of Allen's running, which did net 101 yards and a TD, without pointing out the disastrous Bill's O line play which had Allen running for his life and combined with the loss of their starting and back-up RB's meant that the ONLY Bills rushing option was Allen.

Okay is this Nick Shook a moron or is it that he actually doesn't watch the games? Talk about a shoddy and untrue description of the game today. The idea that this fool is making money covering football is alarming. Here's a few things this hack got wrong: * While drooling all over Darnold's game winning drive and extolling his very nice deep throw down the sideline Shook completely ignored that on the previous series Allen took the Bill's down the field for what could have been the game winning FG and made an equally nice deep back shoulder throw to get the Bills into the red zone. * To lay the game on Allen's last INT is beyond lame. It shows an utter awareness of what went during the previous 59 minutes of football. * Was Allen's 1st INT really that much worse then Darnolds? I mean Allen was working on a FIRST & 25 (thanks to bad penalties) and his INT didn't cost the Bills points or lead to Jets points. Darnold's throw which seemed every bit as bad as Darnolds cost the Jets at least 3 points. Shook also failed to note that the Bill's defense dropped a potential pick 6 on a very poor Darnold throw. * And to remind Shook that the injury that kept Allen on the sidelines for 4 games happened in the pocket. It also would be apparent to anyone that watched today's game that Allen took a much worse beating in the pocket then he did running the ball. What's not sustainable IMO is Allen getting crushed in the pocket on almost every pass play. * And for the record I believe that the NFL is in the process of a seismic shift in offensive football that will require QB's to do what Allen is doing on the ground. And as long as Allen runs smartly, sliding or going out of bounds at every opportunity, his runs will remain an important weapon in his arsenal.

The story on defense IMO was the time Darnold had to throw. To allow a rookie QB to sit back there like that is astonishing. Did the Bills ever lay a hand on Darnold behind the LOS? Given the guys track record for committing turnovers you would think the Bills would have been blitzing the hell out of Darnold. But all to often they tried to rely on a 4 man rush that didn't get near him.

Okay now I'll touch on the QB play today: * Overall I thought both Allen & Darnold looked good and showed me that these two are going to be going at it for a long time in the Division. Sure both guys made rookie mistakes but they also both made some fantastic plays to. * Now some folks are going to quote the passer rating and say Darnold kicked Allen's butt. But I say you have to look beyond the numbers to truly compare the two QB's passing performance. At the risk of sounding like an apologist making excuses when you compare the QB's keep in mind the following: Both QB had very bad INT's. Classic rookie mistakes. Allen had a 2nd INT at the end of the game but that was in desperation time. Let's not forget that Darnold should have had TWO INT's as a Bills player had a clean break and simply dropped what should have been an easy INT. Maybe even a pick 6. Also consider the number of dropped passes Allen had compared to Darnold. Factor in these two things and the two QB's had close to identical games. * Both QB's did a nice job at the end of the game to put their teams in a position to win. And Jet's and Bills fans should be excited by this. Allen led the Bills on a 65 yard drive just missing a TD pass to put the Bills up 23 - 20 with a FG with 2 minutes left. Darnold then one upped him with a game winning TD drive. In each of the drives both QB's had huge throws with Allan's being that beautiful back shoulder pass to Foster and Darnold with that great deep throw to move the ball to the 5 yard line. It's fair to say that both QB's were clutch when the game was on the line. * Allen also had a nice end of the half drive to put the Bills in position to end the half with a FG. He threw a couple of rockets to covert 3rd & longs on the drive. Putting you team in position to score at the end of the half is clutch QBing. * Allen had 101 yards rushing including a TD. He also had a bad fumble but the Jets only got a FG out of it. The truth is Allen took a much nastier beating in the pocket then he took running the football. The # of hits Allen took compared to Darnold was noticeable. And those hits WERE NOT the result of Allen holding onto the ball to long. The Jet's pass rush was getting to him very fast. * Bottom line is both the Jets & Bills should be happy that they probably have their franchise QB's for the next 10 years.

This is wrong on a number of levels. But the most obvious one is that late in the 1st half, at a critical moment in the game, with the Bills facing a 3rd & 15 at their own 5 yard line they trusted Allen to drop back into the end zone to try to convert the 3rd down. And he rewarded their trust with a laser beam pass good for 20 yards and the 1st down. And for the record, Allen had a number of superb passes out of the pocket today.

It's been a while since a Bills loss ruined my dinner but this one did. It's clear as day that there is so much work to be done to rebuild this team that it's almost frightening. Some comments on the game: * The special teams were truly awful. You know your kick coverage is bad when you have to resort to squib kicks. That's what they do in High School. Today's loss is entirely on the ST. Think abut this series of plays. Bills take a 14 - 3 lead and both the offense & defense are playing well. Looks like a possible blowout. ST surrenders a 51 yard KO return giving the Jets the ball in Bills territory. D holds them to a FG but lead now 14 - 6. Bills have a nice drive that ends in a FG and a 17 - 6 lead. Jets return the next KO to the Bills 6 yard line. A couple plays later it's 17 - 13. The Bills momentum is blown and the Jets figure they can win this game. All because the Bills can't cover a freaking KO. * After a strong start the Buffalo defense ended the game on a whimper. Bottom line is that once the Bills went up 23 - 20 late in the 4th quarter the worst thing the BIlls D should have given up was a FG to send the game into OT. This is not the first time this year that the Bills D has not been clutch when they needed to make a stop to win the game. Sure the stats have this D near the top of the heap but stats can be misleading. They are a good but not a great defense. * And who was the defensive coaching genius who decided that you don't put pressure on a rookie QB? For crying out loud the Bills did not register a single sack. Even worse how many times did they even touch Darnold? To watch the Jet's QB sit there in the pocket while our D-line was counting one Mississippi, two Mississippi.... was hard to take. * We really missed McCoy out there today. Not only is he the ONLY RB who is any sort of a threat to catch the football and do damage out of the backfield we sorely missed his blitz pick-ups. One of the reason the Jets blitzed the hell out of Allen (in addition to his being a rookie) was that they knew both Ivory & Murphy wouldn't be able to read the blitz and protect the QB. And they were right. * The lack of any running game beyond Allen's scrambles was amazing to watch. That we were down to our 3rd string RB in the 2nd half didn't help. * The O line had their worst game of the season. My goodness when a line can't run or pass block, you know you have problems. * But the big picture is this - for the 2nd straight week the Bills lost to a division opponent by 4 points and had a chance to win the game late. In a weird way this is not such a bad outcome because it improves our draft position and tells me that we are close to winning these types of games. Had we lost today 27 - 3 then it really would have sucked. This one hurts because we should have won the game. But in the end we just improved our chances to make a great deal on draft day.

I'm very optimistic about Allen's future with the Bills. But then again at halftime in Buffalo's 4th Super Bowl I thought the Bills had the Cowboys right where they wanted them and we all know how that turned out! Previous posters have pretty much hit on everything so I'll just throw out a couple of random observations: * If there is one thing Allen has shown us is his ability to learn & grow as a QB. Pre-draft he took the initiative to obtain one on one coaching and significantly improved his footwork & mechanics. And in spite of not getting the lions share of preseason snaps with the first team and then getting thrown to the wolves in the 2nd half of the Ravens game, the kid has clearly improved in every aspect of his game. There is no reason to think he won't work his butt off in the off season and continue to improve by leaps & bounds. * Allen has shown that he can rehab and come back from a serious injury. This is no small thing because over his career he's going to have to do this a few times. * I disagree with folks about Allen's running. I suspect this will remain a big part of his game because that's where the NFL is going. If you think about it the NFL is NOT innovative. They rely on college football to lead the way. As an avid college football fan I continually see the NFL adopt collegiate offenses a few years after they've been shown to be effective. I think the crazy passing numbers we're seeing out of a few teams are a clear sign that the NFL is adopting the run & gun spread offenses of college football. In other words the NFL is becoming the Big 12. And an important part of that game is a QB that can move the sticks on the ground. With the rule changes protecting runners a savvy QB should be good for 700 - 800 yards rushing per season without increasing his injury risk. As others have noted, Allen has taken a bigger beating in the pocket then he has running the ball. * The poster RocCityRoller came up with the best description I've seen of Allen to date - he's our "baby Farve". The POTENTIAL is there for him to be great but he's still in the early stages of his career and NOTHING is guaranteed.

Did you catch Inside the NFL where they had Kiko miced up? At the end of the game a very pissed off Allen shook Kiko's hand and said "see you in a few weeks". But the way he said it was sort of nasty like I can't wait to get you guys up here to lay a butt whipping on you.

Just want to thank you for all the awesome content you post. I really appreciate it!

Like others I've noticed a completely different vibe from Allen on the passing plays. Pre-injury he showed signs of this explosiveness but over the course of a game it was hit or miss. Now, every time he drops back to pass I get the sense that something good could happen. Weather permitting I fully expect the coaches to turn Allen lose against the Jets in the same way they did in the 2nd half against the fish. While this may lead to a fumble or pick, the Bills defense should be up to the challenge of holding the Jets to 3 on any mistakes. Bottom line is I agree with the author of this thread - there's been a change in how the Bills are progressing Allen. I like it! And what would have been an otherwise boring conclusion to a bad season has morphed into a situation where we're in for a lot of entertainment over the next 4 weeks. What more could you ask for.

I love the optimism - even if it's a tad bit premature! Kelly was special and that's why he has a statue in Canton Ohio. Allen has an enormous amount of work ahead of him to even be discussed in the same terms as Jim Kelly. But the tools are there and that's why the Bills moved up and took the guy with the highest upside at QB in the last draft. But let's all take a breath and keep in mind that Allen is going to have at least one very bad game between now and the end of the season. That's what rookie QB's do. But like I said the optimism of this thread is refreshing and if we have to endure pessimistic, end of the world wailing about how Allen will be the biggest QB bust in history then we sure as heck can have a thread that dares us to contemplate the opposite - a 2nd HOF QB. Why not? It sure beats the alternative.

Long time coming IMO. If the alligator arms on what should have been a TD catch didn't do it then I suspect the coaches took a long hard look at Allen's 2nd INT and came to the conclusion that had KB ran his route aggressively then there wouldn't have been an INT there. As an aside, right after Jones first TD catch against Miami someone posted on the game thread that on that play KB ran his route then seemed to be heading out the side of the end zone to go get something at the concession stands. When I watched the replay it actually looked like that was what he was doing! Good riddance - a clear case of addition by subtraction.

I agree and I suspect that Shady could play this role well once we've set in place the other conditions that allow an offense to use the check down guy effectively.