Sean McDermott harps on the importance of complementary Buffalo Bills football, the offense’s yin and the defense’s yang, where one unit sets up the other for mutual success.
Buffalo suffered a complementary loss Sunday.
Offensive coordinator Ken Dorsey and quarterback Josh Allen delivered another janky performance, scoring 10 points through 54 minutes, but the Bills should have cold-cocked the corroded New England Patriots in Gillette Stadium.
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Now the Bills’ defensive play caller is looking for answers too. Mac Jones is about as uninspiring as they come, but McDermott and his threadbare crew had no answers for the Patriots quarterback.
Boy Wonder Bread, unbothered all afternoon, easily guided New England for the winning touchdown on its final drive to humiliate Buffalo 29-25.
The Bills were the NFL’s sack leaders but got Jones just once and hit him four times. He threw only five incomplete passes among his 30 attempts, the Bills breaking up exactly two.
Josh Allen, meanwhile, insisted his right shoulder isn’t injured enough to affect his throws, and kicker Tyler Bass missed a 42-yard field goal, sending three out of his past four attempts wide right.
Buffalo needed its defense more than ever this season, but the accumulation of injuries is starting to look too dire.
Down a dozen points deep into the fourth quarter, a mammoth complementary sequence occurred. Allen awakened to complete all five passes for 75 yards, with Stefon Diggs pulling off a magnificent slide-and-sprint grab for a touchdown with 5:32 left. Two plays later, Bills safety Jordan Poyer punched the ball away from receiver Kendrick Bourne, and linebacker Terrel Bernard recovered at the Patriots’ 29. Allen scored on a quarterback plunge and connected with Dawson Knox for the two-point conversion to take the lead with 1:53 to go.
That’s the kind of theatrical flourish Bills fans have enjoyed the past few years, a never-in-doubt sigh that has made them so much fun to watch, has made them Super Bowl contenders, has made them relentless, intimidating opponents.
Then Buffalo’s defense wilted.
It makes sense, actually. The idea of a unit sans defensive tackles Ed Oliver and DaQuan Jones, All-Pro linebacker Matt Milano and top cornerback Tre’Davious White, and with still-recovering veteran edge rusher Von Miller unable to make a dent, the notion Buffalo’s defense can carry a complete healthy offense seems ridiculously unfair.
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Yet that’s where we’ve been the past two Sundays.
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How loss to Patriots forces Bills into difficult conversations about slow-starting offense
A week ago, the Bills stonewalled the dilapidated New York Giants at the 1-yard line to preserve an alarming 14-9 victory in Highmark Stadium. That was supposed to be the Bills’ “get right” game after a limp loss to the Jacksonville Jaguars in London.
That’s right. When some wondered if Buffalo must find another offensive gear and gird for shootout victories, the injury-plagued defense is what made sure it didn’t drop into third place in the AFC East by losing to a one-win team.
The clunker proved not to be an outlier.
The Bills faced another one-win team Sunday and struggled — again — way more than Super Bowl hopefuls should. Although defensive genius Bill Belichick was sitting on 299 victories, the Patriots had been outscored 93-20 the previous three games against the Dallas Cowboys, New Orleans Saints and Las Vegas Raiders. A sizzling topic in Boston all week was whether Patriots owner Robert Kraft should let Belichick finish the season.
But the Bills trailed until the two-minute warning and probably don’t rally for the late lead without Poyer and Bernard setting up the short field and quick score with the sort of uncanny moment you cannot count on every week.
Even so, all McDermott had to do Sunday was get his men in position to thwart the historically thwartable Jones and keep him out of the end zone once. In 37 NFL starts, he had notched a single game-winning drive in the fourth quarter. It happened his rookie season, 33 games ago.
Season trends didn’t support Jones having success. New England entered the game ranked 30th in touchdowns, 29th in yards per play, 27th in first downs and 27th in turnover percentage. One quarterback had thrown more interceptions than Jones. Only three owned worse passer ratings.
Against Buffalo, however, Jones would not be denied.
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No matter what McDermott showed him on the decisive drive, the Patriots moved down the field.
McDermott at first went with a dime package, moving Poyer down into a linebacker role along with Bernard and inserting Taylor Rapp at safety with Micah Hyde. The four-man front included three edge rushers: Leonard Floyd and A.J. Epenesa on the edges and Gregory Rousseau inside with usual defensive tackle Jordan Phillips.
Jones tossed a screen pass to tailback Rhamondre Stevenson, who dashed up the right sideline, Phillips and safety Rapp bouncing off him along the way.
Three plays later, on third-and-8, Jones found tight end Hunter Henry over the middle for 14 yards to Buffalo’s 25 with 48 seconds left. The field now drastically shortened and prevent defense less desirable, McDermott switched into nickel, removing Rapp and re-inserting linebacker Tyrel Dodson alongside Bernard. Rookie linebacker Dorian Williams made his second straight start, but Dodson was on the field when it mattered most.
Jones was unfazed. He spotted DeVante Parker for 8 yards, Stevenson for 10 yards and Demario Douglas for 6 more to the 1-yard line (although Belichick accepted cornerback Christian Benford’s interference penalty at the same spot) with 18 seconds remaining.
Gesicki Griddy on #NationalTightEndsDay! @Patriots take the lead!
📺: #BUFvsNE on CBS
📱: Stream on #NFLPlus https://t.co/iTs8HMaXlh pic.twitter.com/KkN4aX6ugG
— NFL (@NFL) October 22, 2023
Jones went after nickelback Taron Johnson the next two plays. Douglas was open, but Jones’ toss was too feathery and sailed incomplete. The next attempt worked. Jones zipped a dart to slanting tight end Mike Gesicki for the TD, 12 seconds to spare.
Of the five targets Jones trusted on the final drive, three had one or zero receptions when it began.
The Bills are 4-3, and this is the “easy” part of their schedule. They host the Tampa Bay Buccaneers on Thursday night. The second half of the schedule includes the Cincinnati Bengals, New York Jets, Philadelphia Eagles, Kansas City Chiefs, Dallas Cowboys and Miami Dolphins.
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Oh, and the Patriots again.
That rematch shouldn’t be scary, but with the way Buffalo has performed lately, compliments might be in short supply for a while.
(Photo: Kathryn Riley / Getty Images)
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