When Josh Allen Plays Like he did Sunday, Bills are Unbeatable
Without trying to put too much on the broad shoulders of 6-foot-5 Josh Allen, the Buffalo Bills will absolutely, positively win the Super Bowl if he keeps playing the way he did Sunday in a 33-21 win over the New England Patriots.
If he doesn't, they won't have much of a chance.
Against the Patriots, Allen showed why the Bills gladly committed 258 mostly guaranteed million dollars to him in a monster contract extension last August.
He knew when he could throw successfully into tight windows and when he could not and acted accordingly. He protected the football by throwing the ball away or taking off on a scramble without taking any unnecessary chances and was never sacked as a result.
Then, when a fourth-down bootleg run call failed to fool the always well-prepared Patriots and Stefon Diggs whiffed on an egregiously poor block attempt, Allen made the play work anyway by showing he's also the best running back on the team — no offense to Devin Singletary. He made two defenders miss him behind the line of scrimmage to pick up the first down with 7 yards to spare.
Had he been stopped there, the Patriots would have had the ball at their 34-yard line while trailing by five points with more than four minutes remaining.
Instead, the Bills were able to run nearly two more minutes off the clock on their way to a touchdown that set the final score, which came when Allen hit tight end Dawson Knox with a 2-yard shovel pass while scrambling to his left on a run-pass option.
That play, perhaps more than any other, underscored how ostensibly impossible it is to stop him when he's on.
Had safety Kyle Dugger not abandoned Knox in coverage, Allen would have been able to take it into the end zone himself. But as soon as Dugger made a step toward Allen, the play changed to a pass, and the Bills, who never trailed, had a much more comfortable cushion with 2:30 to go.
Game, set, match, Mr. Allen.
Whether Sunday's brilliance was enough to bring him back into serious MVP consideration for 2021 is up for debate.
He finished with 314 passing yards and team-high 64 rushing yards on 12 carries. He's the only player in NFL history to record more than 100 TD passes and 20 rushing TDs in his first four seasons.
What can't be disputed is how frustrating it can be for opponents trying to stop Allen when he plays at this level, which obviously hasn't always been the case, or the Bills would not only have wrapped up the AFC East title by now, but also secured homefield advantage throughout the playoffs.
Nevertheless, the damage he did on this day has the rest of the NFL taking notice and his teammates in perpetual awe.
"Josh makes a quarter of a billion dollars," left tackle Dion Dawkins cracked. "Josh is worth every penny. I say that jokingly, but Josh is just one of those guys that he cares about his teammates and he's an uber competitor, and you see it. The media people talk and Josh just keeps his mouth shut and his head down and just goes out and performs, and I wouldn't have expected anything else."
Allen can't get enough credit, as far as defensive tackle Harrison Phillips is concerned.
"Man, that guy is unbelievable," Phillips raved, "and he deserves all the accolades and stuff that you guys throw on him. ... We all trust the ball in his hands. Anytime the game's on the line, we're down, we're up, whatever it is, in 1-7 we trust. So love that guy and, you know, very happy with his success."
Nick Fierro is the publisher of Bills Central. Check out the latest Bills news at www.si.com/nfl/bills and follow Fierro on Twitter at @NickFierro. Email to Nicky300@aol.com.
