It's Time We Start Criticizing Josh Allen More
Josh Allen leads the league in turnovers since he came in the league in 2018.
Josh Allen was selected seventh overall in the 2018 NFL draft by the Buffalo Bills out of the University of Wyoming. While he has had a very successful career thus far, he doesn’t seem to get as much criticism for his reckless playstyle as other big-name QBs like Dak Prescott, Jalen Hurts, and Justin Herbert. Dak Prescott led the league in INTs last season, but he led his team to a 12-5 record. Yet all we heard about was how Dak Is turnover-prone and needs to learn how to take care of the football. Fair enough, but let's keep that same energy with Allen. Through the first six games this season, Hurts threw eight INTs but had his team sitting at 5-1. Again, all we heard was how Hurts is turnover-prone and needs to learn to take care of the football and the Eagles aren’t going anywhere with him playing like that. Once again that is fair criticism but let's keep that same energy with Allen. The last example I’ll use is Justin Herbert. Herbert has consistently had a bad defense since he came into the league in 2020. This past week's game against the Lions was a perfect example. The Chargers put up 38 points and still lost by a field goal. This has consistently been happening where his offense will put up 30+ but the defense is just so bad that they still lose. Yet people criticize Herbert as if he’s supposed to stop the opposing offense from scoring as well.
Last night was a prime example of Josh Allen’s playstyle and TOs costing them games. The Broncos won off a game-winning field goal at the end to win 24-22. Most people will say that the Bills lost because of the penalties at the end that helped the Broncos get in field goal range. Though I like to look at the real problem, and last night's problem was Allen. The Bills as a team had four turnovers and Allen accounted for three of them; two INTs and a fumble lost. The fact the Bills were even still in the game is a testament to how good their defense is. Then again, it also could just be how bad the Broncos are at scoring touchdowns and having to settle for three after every turnover. When I was watching the game and saw Allen score the go-ahead TD with two minutes left to go up by one, I thought to myself “Allen’s about to get lucky again after another multiple-INT game”, but he wasn’t able to be Superman again.
Since Allen came into the league in 2018, he has the most TOs of any qualifying QB with a whopping 94. That’s a little more than one turnover every game since he's played 87 games in his career. Just looking at this season through week 10, he leads the league with 14 total TOs but also leads the league with 26 total TDs. It seems that the TOs are finally starting to catch up to him this season. He can't be turning it over at this rate and expect them to win many games. Especially considering the Bills defense has dealt with so many injuries on the defensive side of the ball this year. Allen for most of his career has had the luxury of having a top defense to bail him out if he made a mistake and that doesn’t seem to be the case this season evidently with them being 5-5.
The comparison Allen has always received makes more and more sense every year now. He has always been compared to Brett Favre for his gunslinger mentality. He does seem to be on the same trajectory as Favre as far as consistently getting his team into the postseason. The only difference is that Brett Favre won a ring. The way it’s looking for Allen, he seems to be the next Philip Rivers, which isn’t a bad thing. Rivers consistently put up great numbers but was in the same conference as Peyton Manning and Tom Brady, so he never made it far in the postseason. Allen is in the same conference as Patrick Mahomes, Joe Burrow, and Lamar Jackson just to name a few. So, it’s looking like a tough career for him at the moment. At the end of the day, Josh Allen is still a great QB and is deservedly a top-10 QB year in and year out. I just think he deserves a lot more blame than he gets for consistently turning the ball over the way he does. Maybe it’s the Madden cover curse coming for Allen and the whole team this season because they can't catch a break on defense. All I know is that Allen and the Bills are in jeopardy of not making the playoffs for the first time in a while and Allen would be a big reason for that.
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