The Bills couldn’t muster up enough positive plays and point on the board against the Cleveland Browns on Sunday in Week 10. Buffalo lost 19-16.
Because of that, the Bills aren’t moving up in power ranking polls around national media outlets. The Bills are starting to fall out of the top-10, a place they’ve been hanging around the past few weeks.
Here’s a look around those national polls and where the Bills sit, heading into Week 11:
USA Today
17. Bills (15):
Their play is getting incrementally worse, and schedule forecasts incrementally harder with Miami, Pittsburgh among opponents that no longer project as lay-ups.
Touchdown Wire
11. Buffalo Bills
(6-3. Last week: 9)
One of the reasons — perhaps the primary reason — the Bills selected Josh Allen with the seventh pick in the 2018 draft, despite serious concerns about his accuracy to all levels of the field, was Allen’s howitzer of an arm. Buffalo’s coaching staff surely thought it would be relatively easy to correct this. Not so, and it really showed in the Bills’ 19-16 loss to the Browns, in which Baker Mayfield made a few more plays than Allen did. Buffalo’s defense allowed a crushing 82-yard drive late in the fourth quarter, but it was Allen’s inability to respond that should really concern the team. Per Pro Football Focus, Allen was 0-for-5 on passes of 20 or more air yards in this game, and for the season, he’s completed just 12 of 43 such passes for 350 yards, one touchdown, three interceptions and a passer rating of 39.7. Only Carolina’s Kyle Allen has a worse passer rating on deep balls among quarterbacks who have taken at least 50% of their team’s snaps this season, and Kyle Allen was nobody’s idea of a franchise quarterback when the season began.
NBC Sports
10. Buffalo Bills (6-3)
Last week’s rank: 11Bills lose and move up? Outside a few teams, this league is falling toward the mean. Bills are in line for a tumble. There are plenty of good teams left on the schedule.
CBS Sports
9. Bills (9)
At 6-3, they are still the Wild-Card leader. But they’ve lost two of the last three games and haven’t looked good doing so. They need more offense.
ESPN
13. Buffalo Bills (6-3)
Week 10 ranking: 13
Most important game left: Dec. 15 at Steelers
The Steelers have been resurgent over the past few weeks, winning four of five games to vault into AFC wild-card contention. With the Colts, Raiders and Titans all jockeying with Buffalo and Pittsburgh for the conference’s two wild-card spots, this late-season matchup will go a long way toward deciding who gets it — and establishing a tiebreaker.
Sporting News
15. Buffalo Bills, 6-3 (13)
The Bills have been good at winning battles of attrition, but you knew they were due for that method to fail on the road against a desperate Browns team that tried to give away the game several times. Josh Allen is simply not playing well enough for them to feel comfortable about their wild-card status.
Bleacher Report
High: 11
Low: 23
Last Week: 11
Week 10 Result: Lost at Cleveland 19-16
The shine is coming off the Buffalo Bills.
After starting the 2019 season 5-1, the Bills have no lost two out of three after falling to the Browns in Cleveland. The reason for that mini-slump isn’t hard to pinpoint.
While the Bills remain a stout defensive team, the offense is sputtering.
Despite facing a Browns run defense that entered Week 10 allowing the third-most yards per game in the league, the Bills managed just 84 rushing yards Sunday—and a third of those came courtesy of quarterback Josh Allen. Allen didn’t do the Bills many favors throwing the ball, hitting on just 22 of 41 throws and missing open receivers on multiple occasions.
“Given their record, schedule and the fact that this isn’t the best year for the AFC, the Bills are probably going to make the playoffs in 2019,” Davenport said. “But Sunday’s loss showed why I can’t take Buffalo seriously as a contender. The Bills just don’t have the offense to hang with the Patriots in a playoff game. Or the Chiefs. Or the Texans. One and done, anyone?”
Gagnon is not sure they’ll even get that far.
“Josh Allen was again useless on deep throws and useless under pressure as a bad Bills offense cost Buffalo the game in Cleveland,” he said. “That unit just isn’t good enough, and the defense doesn’t make enough plays. With a tough schedule coming, Buffalo will be lucky to finish with a winning record despite its 6-2 start.”
Yahoo! Sports
11. Buffalo Bills (6-3, LW: 7)
By now we kind of know the deal with the Bills. They’re not bad but not as good as their record. They shouldn’t have lost to the Browns, but it wasn’t a shock. They are 6-3 and in almost no danger of missing the playoffs because their schedule still lines up well. You can practically pencil them in for a game at the No. 4 seed on wild-card weekend, and nobody outside of Buffalo will be too excited to watch.
NFL.com
16. Bills (6-3)
Previous rank: No. 13
The Bills looked like a middle-of-the-pack team on Sunday against the Browns, hence their placement on the Power Rankings. We saw a breakdown in three phases in Cleveland: On offense, Josh Allen sailed a couple deep balls past open receivers (sound familiar?), and Buffalo was held under 20 total points for the fifth time this season. On defense, the Browns were able to march 82 yards on 10 plays for the go-ahead score late in the fourth quarter. On special teams, kicker Steven Hauschka missed two-field goal attempts, including the 53-yarder that sealed Buffalo’s fate in the final minute. At 6-3, there’s no need to panic. The schedule stays light, with winnable games against the Dolphins and Broncos over the next two weeks. Take care of business there, and a playoff ticket is close to punched. But can this team be trusted right now?
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