It was Buffalo’s best chance and they blew it.
On film, five turnovers and zero sacks produced led to the Bills’ demise as they came up short yet again in a 33-30 overtime loss to the Denver Broncos.
Josh Allen Misfires His Rocket Throws
Josh Allen had four turnovers — two fumbles and two interceptions.
Prior to Saturday, Allen had just two lost fumbles in 14 playoff games.
While he spiraled out of control with the turnovers, he did lead Buffalo to a scoring drive on every possession in the fourth quarter — including a game-tying drive to help force overtime.
At the end of the first half, it was just reckless football.
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With no timeouts and 16 seconds, there was a slim chance of gaining a big chuck of yards and spiking the ball down for another play. The reigning MVP took the gamble and paid the price.
Here’s one of Allen’s two interceptions:
He has a clean pocket and forces one into double coverage downfield. Note that it is also 2nd-and-14; the deep throw attempt and the decision making shows he’s trying to get all 14 yards back in one play.
Had he kept going through his progressions, he had Khalil Shakir open underneath for a short pass to get some of the yardage back.
Buffalo’s defense had just secured Allen an interception just for Allen to put them right back on the field.
The missed opportunities cost the Bills passing offense. Here’s an example from overtime:
Denver shows a cover 3 — one deep safety and two corners defending the deep portion of the field into thirds.
With Brandin Cooks (bottom of the screen) occupying a corner, it frees up Mecole Hardman’s post corner route. Allen has a clean pocket and Hardman has a few yards of separation from the deep safety.
There’s no reason Hardman has to dive for this pass. If Allen lays it out for Hardman to catch and turn up field, Hardman has one man to beat to score a walk-off touchdown.
Nix Takes Advantage of the Lack of QB Pressure
Buffalo had zero sacks and three quarterback hits — all from Gregory Rousseau — as Bo Nix dropped back 46 times.
Here’s a play where Buffalo tries to disguise their intentions until the snap:
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Nix is not fooled when he sees the Bills linebackers drop back into coverage. However, it’s too much depth that they give up, allowing the easy completion underneath. The ball comes out quick and the defensive line doesn’t have a chance to generate pressure.
The chess battle kept going to Nix and Denver’s passing offense. He uses a hard count to get the Bills to show their cards.
On the snap, Buffalo uses Taron Johnson as a corner blitzer — something they tend to do often. Denver picks up the blitz and Nix has a horseshoe pocket to operate for another completion.
The Buffalo defense had their chances to put the Denver offense on its heels and they gave up a 20+ yard pass play on third-and-long.
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Again, Buffalo shows a mug look — the linebackers showing blitz. Nix’s deep dropback indicates that he knows he will have time to throw since Buffalo will not blitz, and that’s exactly what happened.
Nix finds the hole in the zone. There’s nothing more frustrating than seven defenders in the frame as one player (Cole Bishop) makes the tackle.
Denver’s offensive line had all the answers to Buffalo’s defensive line and scheme.
Bills’ Hook and Ladder Magic
Amazing enough, Buffalo ran three hook-and-ladder plays in three different games, and picked up a first down on each one.
Unfortunately, none of these plays came in a win — they occurred in regular season losses to Houston and Philadelphia and against Denver in the playoffs.
Simply put: it’s clear the Buffalo offense practiced these trick plays for situations when they were either on fourth down or needed to pick up a chuck of yardage.
Not only did Buffalo go home early, they also potentially may be lapped by their division rival, New England.
The Patriots are one win away from returning to their first Super Bowl since 2018. So, as they head home to their new stadium, they will see either a rival represent the AFC or a team they lost to represent the AFC for the third straight year.
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