In Week 9 of the NFL season, the 5-2 Buffalo Bills traveled down to Jacksonville to take on the 1-6 Jaguars. The Jaguars team had only won two of their last 23 games, recently broken a 20-game losing streak and hadn’t won a game on American soil since September of 2020. The Bills were 15.5-point favorites going in, and every reasonable NFL fan, including most Jaguars fans, expected the Bills to wipe the floor with them and win by at least double digits. An arrogant text I wrote to my friend right before the game, in which I wrote: “We should be up by 30 at halftime,” encapsulates the overconfidence I and all other Bills fans had in our team for this game
As you all know, however, the Jaguars stymied the Bills’ offense all game long, winning 9-6 in one of the biggest upsets in recent NFL history; this was the seventh-largest NFL upset since 1990. In my years as a Bills fan while I have seen some terrible football and painful, unexplainable losses that left me in disbelief this ranks up there as one of the worst losses I have ever experienced. This game brought me back to the days of EJ Manuel, Kyle Orton, Tyrod Taylor and rookie Josh Allen, seasons when we had offenses that consistently put up less than 20 points and forced us to rely on our defense to try to carry us to ugly, low scoring wins. Allen played with reckless abandon, making poor decisions, taking bad sacks and turning the ball over at the worst possible times. This was not the skilled, calm and confident Allen we have become accustomed to, the one that finished second in MVP voting last year and was the favorite this year going into this game. Rather, we saw a player that was more like the Allen that came into the league as an inexperienced rookie playing inconsistently over his first two seasons.
Allen finished with a stat line of 31/47 for 264 yards and no touchdowns while throwing two interceptions, losing a fumble and being sacked four times. This was his first time with three turnovers since a loss to the Patriots over two years ago in week 4 of the 2019 season. It was also the first time the offense put up this few of points since a 13-6 loss to the Jets in week 17 of the 2019 season, when the Bills had already clinched a playoff berth and rested almost all of their starters.
The lone bright spot in the game was the Bills number-one ranked defense, which kept that Jaguars without a touchdown, holding them to 9 points and 218 total net yards. Sadly, this wasn’t enough, as the Bills’ offense, after scoring field goals on their first two drives, ended every other drive of the game with a punt, turnover or turnover on downs. The center of their offensive struggles was the offensive line, which allowed Jaguars’ pass rushers to constantly breakthrough into the Buffalo backfield, forcing Josh Allen to have to leave the pocket too early and rush throws. This completely shut down the Bills rushing attack.
In this game, the star of the show was ironically Jaguars’ linebacker Josh Allen, who wreaked havoc on his namesake and the rest of the Bills’ offense, finishing the game with an interception, a fumble and a sack. In his postgame interview, Allen said he wanted to “show them who the real J is,” and he certainly did just that.
For the Bills and their Josh Allen, this game, being one of their worst performances in recent memory, still only counts as one in the loss column, and is certainly not fatal for their season. Although the Patriots are right on their tail, at 5-3 the Bills are still in the driver’s seat in the AFC East. Their matchup next week against the 2-6 Jets gives them a great opportunity to rebound from this loss.
Hopefully it will serve as an eye opener and the Bills will use this loss to make some big improvements. The offensive line needs to step up with their run and pass blocking, as well as doing a better job picking up blitzes. Their receivers need to create more separation, their running backs must produce more yards after contact, and most importantly, Josh Allen has to play like his usual self. This loss hurts a lot, but I have faith in this Bills team and still fully expect them to win the AFC East, make a deep run in the playoffs and potentially win a Super Bowl.