Hello, resident Josh Allen "Hater" here to Report

[HappyDays]

I'm finding it difficult to judge Allen's performance last night because he didn't get to be Josh Allen. We've seen him struggle early and then suddenly get on fire in the 4th quarter. Last night he did that on one drive, and then the defense made sure he didn't get the ball back. I also feel that they have neutered his running ability way too much as I have been saying since the start of the season. Yes he should have a pass first mentality but on a night where the Titans had excellent coverage and weren't spying him he should have taken off a lot more. There's no reason Tannehilll should ever be running the ball more effectively than Allen. Let him play his game.

[Mango]

8 hours ago, Chemical said:

The one silver lining in this season is Josh Allen. The drops today including one leading to an int and 7-0 hole were devastating and obv not his fault. He had a couple bad plays Including the other int, but everyone does. 
 

The dead canary in the coal mine is McDermott’s defense. He’s responsible for that D and the last 3 weeks we played short handed offenses but were still torched. 
 

This coach can’t adjust. He can’t play chess against another head coach. We have one td in the 3rd qtr and that’s it. What does that tell you?

I have been critical of Josh. Last night was still much better than a lot of his other clunkers, but some of the same traits staring down receivers, pointing the ball on throws, late reads/throws behind. The floor is definitely raised. He did do a very good job in pocket presence last night. 

One thing I took away (In addition to the defense having major issues so far this season) is Josh is not good enough YET to make up for a mediocre receiving corp. Granted the run game is non-existent at the moment, but Diggs, Beasley, and a blossoming rookie are about what you can afford or maybe even a little better than what you get once you pay your QB. Nothing to worry about, but definitely something to watch when guys go down. 

[Over 29 years of fanhood]

8 hours ago, BigDingus said:

And my professional opinion is Allen is A-OK still 😉

So is Leslie Frazier. So is Brian Daboll. 

Let's look at this situation for what it really is:

 

1) This is the NFL. Even the best teams have bad games. 

2) This is the NFL. Even great QB's have bad games.

3) We were missing our best CB in White

4) We were missing a key offensive weapon in 1,000+ yard receiver & deep threat John Brown

5) We were missing Matt Milano...someone we desperately need to fortify the LB corps

6) Our DT's have been suspect all year, and as I say each week, Star is missed

7) This might be the most important thing to remember, the Titans are a VERY GOOD TEAM. 

On top of the other inactive players, injured, IR or otherwise, we were going to lose at some point. The Titans made it to the AFC Championship game last year, we were playing on the road (and for the first time, seems the limited crowd noise provided some semblance of home field advantage), and the team wasn't up to the task. TODAY.

Yes, the Titans were limited as well & had less practice time due to COVID, but the NFL is weird. The rest could've done them some good, they had a lot to prove, the Bills could've came in overconfident, etc. Allen made some bone-headed mistakes, but so did others. Dropped passes, inability to cover the middle of the field, and our Achilles heal under McDermott - our poor play & lack of adjustments after half, penalties, poor special teams play (though Bojorquez was nailing his punts), etc. all of which contributed to the results tonight.

Lesson hopefully learned. I don't expect our defense to suddenly play great again until the personnel required has returned, but I also don't foresee Allen resorting back to this type of play after the progress he's made this year. So chin up Bills fans, our schedule is a LOT more difficult than the cake walk we had last year. If we finish 10-6 with this schedule, it's 100 x more impressive than 2019.

/this concludes tonight's Ted Talk

I was really annoyed that they kept harping on the Titans rest as detrimental... remind me again why teams Prize the top two divisional playoff slots? 

[Mango]

2 hours ago, GunnerBill said:

 

So in the spirit of full disclosure.... I was the jinx. The first weekend of the season I had washed the cushions on my main sofa and they were not quite dry yet so I ended up watching the Jets game from the second sofa. We won. I have then watched Miami, LA and LV from the same second sofa. However, this game last night was late it was midnight UK time when we kicked off and my desire for comfort got the better of me and I switched back to my main sofa........ I apologise to Bills Mafia.

 

This is a team game, and fandom is no different. Normally we have watched the games outside with a group of the same6 or so friends on a projector. Being an unplanned Tuesday night with a chance of rain. I watched at home inside on the projector. We actually were going to watch the Miami game inside, but then the broadcast cut out so we ran a fire drill to get everything set up in the yard. And boom, comeback victory!

I told them last night they are never ever allowed to make any other plans and I will cover the projector with tarps if need be moving forward. Sorry team!

[CincyBillsFan]

6 hours ago, Thurman#1 said:

 

 

While the deflected INT can't be blamed all on Allen, the bad throw was absolutely a contributing factor. Roberts still should've caught it, but a better pass and he likely does. Both share the blame there.

 

Agree that Allen is the silver lining, so far.

 

It seems, though, as if teams have figured out one thing, that they need to play deep and not allow the long balls, that they are going to try to force Josh and the offense to play small-ball, which requires consistency. Today, that consistency just wasn't there. This is how teams will play us, IMO. How will we respond?

 

Posters have alluded to the idea that maybe the league has caught up with Allen and the Bills offense and this is the blueprint.  The only thing wrong with this notion is that a lot has to go right in other areas for this approach to consistently work against the Bills O.

 

*  First, you need an offense that can take away Bills possessions by maintaining long drives.  The Titans did this starting at the end of the first half.  First there was their 90 yard TD drive that closed out the first half.  Then they had a 5 plus minute drive to the Bills 45 that resulted in a punt to the Bill's 2 yard line to start off the 2nd half.  The Bills then have a good drive that is snuffed out by a bad pass.  After that the Bills had only one more possession with their 1st team O and that was for a TD.

 

*  9 times out of 10, that pass to Roberts is either caught for a first down or dropped, not intercepted. 

 

*  Teams re not going to get big punt returns to the Bills 30 yard line every game.

 

*  The Bills won't drop 5 - 6 passes every week against this type of D.

 

*  The Bills won't commit all those false starts every week either

 

Other teams that use this approach, we're looking at you NE, will keep the Bills from exploding for over 30 points and 400 yards of O. But the Bills O will move the ball and score while chewing up TOP.  These will be games the Bills win 24 - 16. 

 

A lot went wrong for the Bills and a lot went right for the Titans to give us last nights result.  We may not see things play out this way again this season.

[NewEra]

9 hours ago, BigDingus said:

And my professional opinion is Allen is A-OK still 😉

So is Leslie Frazier. So is Brian Daboll. 

Let's look at this situation for what it really is:

 

1) This is the NFL. Even the best teams have bad games. 

2) This is the NFL. Even great QB's have bad games.

3) We were missing our best CB in White

4) We were missing a key offensive weapon in 1,000+ yard receiver & deep threat John Brown

5) We were missing Matt Milano...someone we desperately need to fortify the LB corps

6) Our DT's have been suspect all year, and as I say each week, Star is missed

7) This might be the most important thing to remember, the Titans are a VERY GOOD TEAM. 

On top of the other inactive players, injured, IR or otherwise, we were going to lose at some point. The Titans made it to the AFC Championship game last year, we were playing on the road (and for the first time, seems the limited crowd noise provided some semblance of home field advantage), and the team wasn't up to the task. TODAY.

Yes, the Titans were limited as well & had less practice time due to COVID, but the NFL is weird. The rest could've done them some good, they had a lot to prove, the Bills could've came in overconfident, etc. Allen made some bone-headed mistakes, but so did others. Dropped passes, inability to cover the middle of the field, and our Achilles heal under McDermott - our poor play & lack of adjustments after half, penalties, poor special teams play (though Bojorquez was nailing his punts), etc. all of which contributed to the results tonight.

Lesson hopefully learned. I don't expect our defense to suddenly play great again until the personnel required has returned, but I also don't foresee Allen resorting back to this type of play after the progress he's made this year. So chin up Bills fans, our schedule is a LOT more difficult than the cake walk we had last year. If we finish 10-6 with this schedule, it's 100 x more impressive than 2019.

/this concludes tonight's Ted Talk

Great post.  
 

I hate tbd after losses.  Especially the 1st loss of the game.  

[LanderPoke]

When Milano doesn't play this defense sucks ass

1 hour ago, HappyDays said:

I'm finding it difficult to judge Allen's performance last night because he didn't get to be Josh Allen. We've seen him struggle early and then suddenly get on fire in the 4th quarter. Last night he did that on one drive, and then the defense made sure he didn't get the ball back. I also feel that they have neutered his running ability way too much as I have been saying since the start of the season. Yes he should have a pass first mentality but on a night where the Titans had excellent coverage and weren't spying him he should have taken off a lot more. There's no reason Tannehilll should ever be running the ball more effectively than Allen. Let him play his game.

Yes. As good as Josh is passing the ball, I feel we're seeing a fake version of Josh. He's been coached out of running. sad. Josh's prodigious running ability is what makes Josh Josh.

[Ralonzo]

10 hours ago, BigDingus said:

And my professional opinion is Allen is A-OK still 😉

 

I'm not terribly worried. Allen's issues tonight were his youth and the amount of dog he has in him.

 

Titans game plan was obviously to bluff man on the under routes but drop off to flood the intermediates (cover-6? someone who XO's has to show me the all-22). A veteran QB will take those open 6 yard slants and digs and outs and matriculate down the field. In the 3rd Q, with all that had gone wrong against the Bills and as inept as they'd been, it was 21-10 and the Bills were on the way back into the game with a 98-yard drive by dinking and dunking and dunking and dinking. That would have been demoralizing to the Titans. Allen was executing beautifully, but he got impatient and tried to finesse one to Davis on the 2nd level, and that was his first "real" interception of the year and it was born of trying to make a play to get even for all the teams' prior errors, instead of staying on schedule and taking the free money that a soulless automaton like Brady would.

[starrymessenger]

Not worried about Allen. He’s a franchise player and quite possibly, in due course, elite.  I think we finally won the QB sweepstakes.

[Scott7975]

Josh will be fine. One he didn't get much help on some of his passes. The other thing is I think he got some looks that confused him. 

 

Titans did a good job. 

[BBills88]

The Titans were well rested with plenty (2 Weeks) of time to gameplan against the Bills. 

 

Its cool, we will see them in the playoffs, we're the Bills will have the last laugh.

[NewEra]

12 hours ago, Nextmanup said:

Of note is the fact that we had one of the easier schedules in the league through our first 4 games, but have the 5th hardest for the remainder of the season, starting tonight with the loss in Nashville.

 

We also saw the old Josh Allen tonight, not the new one, which means the old one isn't quite dead yet.

 

It all hinges on New England.  We were blessed that Newton went down when he did.  It will help a lot.

 

 

We saw the old josh on a handful Of plays imo.  The titans played a great zone D last night that confused him on a few plays.  Our WRs/TEs dropped several passes.  Penalties came at the worst times.  It was a mess.  Josh was not a mess last night.  He had one terrible throw and 2 more (that I recall) that he shouldn’t have thrown.  The first pick wasn’t his fault.  He ran when he was supposed to and picked up key yards.  The TD to Yeldon was amazing.  On our first Td drive, when we seemed to keep kicking ourselves with negative plays, Josh kept digging us out and led us to 7.  Old josh wouldn’t have done what he did on that drive.  He was amazing on that drive imo.
 

It was easily his worst game of the year, in a year where he’s been close to flawless.  It happens.  

[SlimShady'sSpaceForce]

2 hours ago, Scott7975 said:

Josh will be fine. One he didn't get much help on some of his passes. The other thing is I think he got some looks that confused him. 

 

Titans did a good job. 

close

 

i said it today that IMO that the Titans defense was just too good covering the WR’s coupled with the drops mad for a bad game. 
 

[Mr. WEO]

John Brown has been replaced by the rook Davis.  His days of 1000 yard seasons ended when Diggs and Davis showed up.  If he was healthy, he should be trade bait.

 

The Bills D struggled to beat back Fitzmagic and the Fins--giviong up 15 4th Q points  (Bills won on a game ending recovered onside kick) and coughed up a gigantic second half lead the the Rams---with Tre White on the field.  Against the Raiders, the D gave up a late 4th Q 80 TD drive in 2 minutes.  The Bills again recovered the onsides.

 

This D is soft.  Chokers.

 

 

[Billsfan1972]

17 hours ago, Scott7975 said:

Josh will be fine. One he didn't get much help on some of his passes. The other thing is I think he got some looks that confused him. 

 

Titans did a good job. 

Yes they did, however there were times where he had plenty of time & the old Josh would have beaten them with his legs.  With so many in coverage, unless he's still injured, there seemed opportunities to run.

 

Love Diggs & like that Josh is targetting him, but seemed too at times he was forcing it to him.

[Scott7975]

1 hour ago, Billsfan1972 said:

Yes they did, however there were times where he had plenty of time & the old Josh would have beaten them with his legs.  With so many in coverage, unless he's still injured, there seemed opportunities to run.

 

Love Diggs & like that Josh is targetting him, but seemed too at times he was forcing it to him.

I've thought for a few weeks now that he is being coached not to run. The guy used to take off in an opening. If you watch him now he is hesitant like he is fighting his instinct to take off and it causes what used to be a big gain to close up an not be much of a gain if any. I still want this kid to run when it's there but he isn't. That has t be coaching. Plus you can tell he still has a shoulder problem. 

 

 

I also agree with the Diggs part and commented elsewhere that I don't understand why he didn't spread the ball this week. He was so good at it in other weeks. It could be that the defense confused him. You can tell he was confused   

Edited October 15, 2020 by Scott7975

[Apocalypse Nuts]

Good points, OP.  The Bills were stiff and slow and it was completely obvious.  All that time off just primed the Titans for a great game.  Not practicing and everything didn't hurt those players nearly as much as everyone was assuming it would.  They're pros and they ended up getting a lot of good rest sitting around just itching to get back into things.  Steve Tasker called this one correctly last week saying just that.  They Titans had something to prove and very fresh legs on which to do it.  The Bills were in a terrible position just waiting to see if they were even going to play this game or not.  I'm certain that most of them thought they would not and regardless of that, they were just out of their routine and out of rhythm.

 

The Bills do have some real problem areas, sure.  That's painfully obvious.  But Tuesday night was a perfect storm of bad luck, being short-handed and out of rhythm and going up against a VERY well rested team with a chip on its shoulder that had also figured out how to take all the big plays away from the offense to a degree they hadn't seen yet this season.  IMO anyway.  Unfortunately, I think the KC game will be another loss unless they can really figure some things out quickly.  But they'll get back on track sooner rather than later.  At least I'm confident that the offense will.  The D is another question entirely.  Yuck.

Edited October 15, 2020 by Distorted One

[Hapless Bills Fan]

On 10/14/2020 at 10:14 AM, Ralonzo said:

 

I'm not terribly worried. Allen's issues tonight were his youth and the amount of dog he has in him.

 

Titans game plan was obviously to bluff man on the under routes but drop off to flood the intermediates (cover-6? someone who XO's has to show me the all-22). A veteran QB will take those open 6 yard slants and digs and outs and matriculate down the field. In the 3rd Q, with all that had gone wrong against the Bills and as inept as they'd been, it was 21-10 and the Bills were on the way back into the game with a 98-yard drive by dinking and dunking and dunking and dinking. That would have been demoralizing to the Titans. Allen was executing beautifully, but he got impatient and tried to finesse one to Davis on the 2nd level, and that was his first "real" interception of the year and it was born of trying to make a play to get even for all the teams' prior errors, instead of staying on schedule and taking the free money that a soulless automaton like Brady would.

 

This was posted in another thread, I think credit to @Warcodered, but it has some good stuff about what the Titans did defensively

 

[jrober38]

The Bills are a good team. They have a good offense, a very good pass game and what appears to be a below average defense.

 

Allen is easily a top 10 QB right now, maybe top 5, we have one of the best WR groups in the league and a decent line. Defensively we've taken a step back. Losing Jordan Phillips and Star Lotuleilei was huge. We can't stop the run without them and our linebackers are having to fight through too much trash to get to the ball. We need Tre White back asap.

 

The Chiefs and Titans are the cream of the crop in the AFC. The Bills are right behind them.

[Ralonzo]

4 hours ago, Hapless Bills Fan said:

 

This was posted in another thread, I think credit to @Warcodered, but it has some good stuff about what the Titans did defensively

 

 

I'm just Joe Blow fan but it was pretty obvious what happened Tuesday.

 

That's why I'm not terribly worried about it. Allen is a legit Franchise dude. If anyone is still panicking, and happens to put any credence on this old drunk, then take a deep breath, and understand that this is a legitimate Bills squad, not pretenders. The running game and Fraziers inexplicable back-offs are not insurmountable problems with the current personnel.

 

Edit: that route to Davis at 40:00 ish, looks like Davis was supposed to settle in the area instead of digging. Apart from that, love the breakdown.

 

Edited October 16, 2020 by Ralonzo