Two weeks ago, I wrote a piece looking at how Josh Allen has performed in the final three minutes of close games, when the Bills are trailing by seven or less, tied, or playing in overtime. It did pretty well in terms of readership, which I always appreciate, and as usually happens when I go down one of these statistical wormholes, the comments gave me a few more things to think about. There were people saying that some of these losses were not Josh Allen’s fault, which is obviously fair. There were also people who wanted more context around each possession and a better breakdown of what actually happened instead of simply looking at whether the Bills won or lost. All of those were legitimate points, and one of the things I enjoy about doing these pieces is that one answer usually creates three more questions.
So I started thinking about the other side of it. If we are going to look at Josh Allen in the final three minutes of close games and overtime, then we should probably do the exact same thing with the Bills defense.
When Allen gives them a lead of seven points or less, how often do they actually protect it?
When the game is tied, how often does the defense prevent the opponent from taking the lead?
And when Buffalo is trailing by seven or less, how often does the defense actually get the football back to Allen with enough time to realistically do something with it?