Well, this could be a very blast for Bills Mafia to pump the brakes on making those Super Bowl reservations. The Buffalo Bills, a classy pick by many to not only win the AFC East (seemingly a given for many prognosticators) but also win the AFC and even Super Bowl 56, are 0-1 after a tremendously lame offensive performance which led to a 23-16 defeat at the hands of the Pittsburgh Steelers. One of the recent button topics heading into this season of high expectations was how would the Bills handle playing every game this season with a glowing target on their collective back? One week in, I’d need to say not alright.
“This is that the National League,” said safety Micah Hyde. “We’re getting to get everybody’s best regardless. It doesn’t matter if you visited the AFC Championship Game or not, you’re getting to get everybody’s best.” There’s truth therein , obviously. But whether Hyde or any of the Bills want to admit it or not, they’re getting to generally get a far better shot than, say the Jets or Jaguars are getting to get from an opponent and on today the Bills weren’t nearly capable of surviving the repetitive body blows that Pittsburgh delivered. We must start with the offense because let’s face it, after what Josh Allen and his cohorts did in 2020, we all thought they might just devour where they left off and keep rolling over defenses.
Maybe which will start next week in Miami, but the Steelers defense – which I said all week was getting to give the Bills trouble – laid out a blueprint for the Dolphins et al. to follow. Rush with four against what seemed like a really inept offensive line, cover with seven, and Allen suddenly becomes human. Coach Sean McDermott holds his tongue alright after every game, win or lose, but he was clearly perturbed by the play of the road which allowed three sacks, numerous pressures, and drew six holding penalties, two of which were declined because the Steelers didn’t got to accept supported the results of the play.
“I’ve needed to check out that and that i think I already know where I’m at thereon, but I got to check out that and adjustments need to be made,” McDermott said. Read between the lines thereon comment and that I think it clearly states that he’ll be looking to form changes. What those could be, I’m unsure because really, what’s he getting to do? It’s not like he can play not-ready-for-primetime rookie tackle Spencer Brown in situ of left tackle Dion Dawkins who was hell for leather awful with three holds.
Cody Ford and Ike Boettger shared the right guard, but neither of them was nailed for holding, so maybe Boettger replaces Jon Feliciano who played the role of a turnstile much of the day and had one holding penalty. Is all-purpose Ryan Bates an option at center in situ of Mitch Morse? I can’t see how that creates anything better.
This is an enormous problem early for the Bills because if the road play doesn’t improve, the offense goes to sputter, even with an MVP-level quarterback who has an arsenal of weapons at his disposal. “I think kudos to them,” Morse said of the Steelers. “They came out and that we just put ourselves in bad situations, whether it’s communication or technique. we all know we have a special guy, No. 17, back there, and it’s our job regardless of what the play call is to stay him as clean as possible. And as an offensive line, we all know we didn’t do this also as we could. the good thing about offensive line is you win as an offensive line, all five guys, and you lose as an offensive line, all five guys, so it’ll be an excellent opportunity to find out tons of stuff from this game.”
