Bills made NFL history with poor end-of-game management vs. Texans

The Buffalo Bills made a bit of NFL history in their Week 5 loss to the Houston Texans, but not for a good reason.

Geoff Burke-Imagn Images

The Buffalo Bills’ end-of-game clock management in their Week 5 loss to the Houston Texans wasn’t just poor—it was historically poor.

An intentional grounding penalty forced Houston to punt the ball from midfield with under a minute remaining in the 20-20 contest, giving Buffalo possession on its own three-yard line with zero timeouts at its disposal. Rather than attempt to run out the clock and force overtime, the Bills threw three consecutive incomplete passes, taking just 16 seconds off the clock before punting the ball back to the Texans. Robert Woods returned the punt past midfield before C.J. Stroud found Dare Ogunbowale for five yards on the next play, positioning Ka’imi Fairbairn for the game-winning 59-yard field goal.

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It was simply an asinine bit of clock mismanagement that earned ridicule from fans and neutral pundits alike. The game management mishap was so absurd, in fact, that it allowed Buffalo to accomplish an, admittedly undesirable, feat: no team in at least the last four decades has handled a game-ending scenario in the way the Bills did Sunday in Houston.

“The Bills are the only team in the last 45 years to be tied or leading in the final minute of the game, inside their own 5-yard line and throw three straight passes, per ESPN Research,” ESPN’s Alaina Getzenberg wrote in a recent article. 

Geoff Burke-Imagn Images

It’s, again, not a necessarily good reason to go in the history books, but the tidbit of information does a great job of illustrating just how bizarre the mismanagement was. Buffalo’s offense was struggling through the majority of its Week 5 clash, with Allen finishing the game nine of 30 passing; the running game was the only element of the Bills’ offensive attack that had consistently flashed throughout the day, and to completely eliminate it from the gameplan when leaning on the ground was so obviously the most auspicious strategy simply made no sense.

The decision to attempt three consecutive passes garnered pushback from fans, analysts, and even some within the Buffalo locker room, with a veteran Bills player telling The Buffalo News’ Ryan O’Halloran that he “hope[s] [the coaches] learn from” their late game mismanagement after the Week 5 loss. Head coach Sean McDermott has taken blame for the decision; he and the rest of the coaching staff will attempt to fix their game management woes as they prepare for their Week 6 Monday Night Football clash with the New York Jets.

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