Well We are now two games into the regular season and this Buffalo Bills offense appears to be unstoppable. Touchdowns on their first four drives last night, 78 points in two games, 9 total touchdowns from Josh Allen, no turnovers on offense and very few, if any, bad decisions by the coaching staff.
The Bills came out last night doing exactly what they did the prior week against the Texans. They mixed up first down runs with short passes and moved up and down the field as if The Lions we're playing without a defense. James Cook had a tremendous game averaging 6.4 yards per carry. Dalton Kincaid again had a great game with 95 receiving yards to go along with his 150 receiving yards last week. He is clearly showing the NFL and Bills fans why he was drafted in the first round and why they moved up to draft him. If he can stay healthy this year this offense May end up being the best offense in the history of the Bills.
Now don't get me wrong, they have gotten some breaks period last week James Cook fumble and the bills recovered, Josh through a terrible pass into the end zone which was an easy interception which was dropped by the Texans defensive back Lassiter. Last night, Josh got sacked and fumble only to have it recovered by one of his offensive lineman. Similarly, he made a bad decision and had a pass intercepted on a deflection near the goal line only to have it overturned due to a holding penalty the Lions defender. That's four possible turnovers in two games, all of which have gone Buffalo's way. That's not going to be the case the entire year.
One worry I have about the next few games is the status of DJ Moore. The offense looks totally different when he is not on the field. Both of the touchdowns in the last two weeks to Josh Palmer were deep passes where the Opposing teams safety seemed concerned about DJ Moore then he did about the actual target. In addition, as I predicted during the offseason, DJ Moore’s Addition to the offense has opened up the passing game to The other receivers on the team. This was very evident in last night's game as the offense looked totally different in the second half than it did in the first half. During the first half, the Bills move the ball up and down the field like clockwork. Once more got hurt and left the lineup, the Bill's downfield passing game pretty much disappeared. Yes they still scored points in the second half but anyone who watched the game could see that the drives faced many 3rd situations and There were few if any passes downfield. Lucky for the Bills that Keon Coleman has shown the last two weeks to be an extremely reliable target for Josh Allen. Two of his catches on 3rd downs kept Bill's drives alive Resulting in touchdowns. Knock on wood but yesterday's game showed many of us why he was drafted so highly. Let's hope his development continues as he matures not only as a football player but as an individual.
Now let's talk about defense. One would have thought coming into the game that if you held Gibbs to less than 60 yards rushing the Bills would have run away with the game. Instead, The bill's defense showed but for the sporadic Sets of down that our secondary is overmatched, our linebacking crew is not good enough to cover decent receivers with a decent quarterback and our defensive line while pressuring the quarterback on occasion, doesn't get enough pressure on a down by down basis to good offenses. Yes we had five separate occasions last night where we forced the Lions into three and outs. That said, however, How many times did we see the Lions succeed on 3rd and and even 4th and long situations? On a 4th and 8th situation and a 4th and 18 situation we didn't get enough of a pass rush and Goff Was able to make plays. In addition, other than Rousseau and Walker, The defense has been unable to pressure quarterbacks the last two weeks. Yes Hoecht and Chubb Had sacks Last night but other than those two occasions they were pretty much invisible on the field. With the inexperience that we have in the defensive secondary and the inability of our linebackers to cover tight ends and wide receivers, we need a much better pass rush. When we Pressure the quarterback Kind of good things happen. When we don't pressure the quarterback the Bill's defense has been picked apart. We are only the second team in the history of the NFL that has given up 30 or more points in back to back games and won both of them. Eventually, someone is going to figure out how to hold our offense to under 30 points. At that time we our defense to carry this team. I am not quite sure that's going to happen unless and until the young cornerbacks Figure out Leonard's defense and figure out how to lockdown the good wide receivers. Way too many times last night and in the first game our cornerback took penalties which kept the Lions drives alive and kept our offense off the field.
Overall if you told me coming into the season that we would be 2-0 against two very good teams And that our offense had scored 78 points I would have thought you were nuts. In the same vein, however, if you told me that the bill's defense had given up more than 30 points in both games I would have thought that we would be 0-2 Instead of 2-0. Eventually the brakes are going to go against us. We are not going to be recovering our own fumbles and defenders are going to catch, rather than drop, Interceptions. In addition, offenses are going to be able to exploit our secondary. Over the next three weeks we have Drake Maye, Matthew Stafford And Justin Hebert coming in to play against the Bills. All three are very good quarterbacks. All three have good wide receivers. We need to figure out a way to stop these teams from being able to score almost at will against.
My prediction for next week is that we crush the Chargers. 34-20 Final With James Cook again rushing for more than 100 yards and Josh Allen combining for 4 touchdowns between pass and run. Looking forward to this ride. I've been watching this team very closely since 1964’s AFL Championship Game when they beat the Chargers. One Year later, after back to back AFL Championships, I was convinced that I was one of the luckiest kids in the world having a team like the Buffalo Bills to root for. Since then it's been heartache and disappointment. This year with a new staff and new weapons for Josh, I really think we have a chance to go all the way. As longtime Red Sox fans used to say “Just one before I die”. At my age I would take one but would really like two or three