Buffalo Bills Head In To Week Four Needing a Road Win At Miami Dolphins

The Buffalo Bills dropped to 1-2 on the 2009 season by losing 27-7 to the visiting New Orleans Saints Sunday, in a contest that wasn't decided until well in to the fourth quarter.

The high powered New Orleans' offense, led by QB Drew Brees, had engineered nine TDs in their first two games. With 14 minutes left in the game, the Saints had only been able to muster 10 points.

There was the forecast of bad weather, which would have made it a challenge for the Saints to play their normal game, especially since they play inside of a domed stadium, but the weather never became an issue.

Watching the experts panel on ESPN before the game, no one thought the Bills' defense would be able to step up and control Brees, but control him they did. Chris Kelsay, Aaron Schoebel, Kyle Williams, and Marcus Stroud all seemed to be in Brees's face. Did not see much or hear about Aaron Maybin, so not sure why his name was not called during the game.

The Bills' defense put fairly consistent pressure on Brees and forced him in to a higher number of dump off throws to avoid taking a sack. What is fairly remarkable about this is that Buffalo lost half of their backfield due to injuries.

Donte Whitner (thumb) and Leodis McKelvin (cracked fibula) departed and did not return. Bryan Scott (ankle) also was hurt. That the reserves were able to shut down Brees to 172 yards passing and no TD passes is pretty impressive.

Unfortunately for the Bills, their offense picked a strange time to disappear. The game seemed to go back and forth waiting for one team to step up and establish that they wanted to control the game and claim a victory. The Bills wound up scoring their only points of the day on their special teams, as the offense was not able to generate anything of significance. Brian Moorman threw a 25-yard pass off a fake field goal to Ryan Denney (defensive end), and he trotted in for their lone score of the day.

One of the keys to any football game is the battle for field position. The Bills' starting field position after receiving six kickoffs: their own 16, 25, 24, 19, 27, and 20. The Bills' starting field position after receiving four punts: their own 24, 3, 13, and 21. As these numbers bear out, you can see the Saints were able to contain the Bills' return game and forced the offense to repeatedly drive the length of the field for the whole game.

The Bills' offense and head Offensive Coordinator Alex Van Pelt were not up to the challenge.

It also should be pointed out that Roscoe Parrish had a key fumble on special teams that led to New Orleans taking the lead. He did relatively little in his punt returns throughout the game (except for fumbling) and filled in for McKelvin on kick off returns, but did nothing much there either.

If the Bills were showcasing Parrish for a potential trade, they now know that they shouldn't expect to receive anything of signifigance for him.

Van Pelt will need to go back to the drawing board and find some other ways to get the ball in the hands of Terrell Owens and Lee Evans. There weren't any reverses to T.O. this game, and in fact, he never even got a catch, which broke a streak that was third longest in league history.

Maybe the Bills should attempt to set up trips receivers on one side of the field, to make it harder to contain both Owens and Evans. It seems unfathomable that this talented pair of WRs lack the shake and bake skills necessary to get open on short, intermediate, or long routes. What will happen when the weather does turn nasty?

While the game was still in doubt in the fourth quarter, there were three consecutive snaps from Geoff Hangartner that were nowhere near where Trent Edwards was expecting the snap to go to. The bad hikes killed the flow of each play, with two of them resulting in sacks. You just cannot have these kind of mistakes at crunch time. It's unacceptable if you are trying to be a winning team in the playoffs.

Twice Buffalo drove the ball down to the fringe of Rian Lindell's outer range for field goals, only to see drives stall at the New Orleans 40 and 47. Both times they had a chance to pin New Orleans deep inside their own territory, but both times Brian Moorman's punt went in to the end zone.

Moorman did have one punt downed on the three-yard line, but the other two opportunities did not materialize. Three times the Bills were flagged for an illegal block on a punt return or kick return (Wendling, Harris, and Byrd), and each time those flags sent the Bills backward, deep into their own end of the field.

The lack of discipline on special teams and the failure to win the special teams' battles were some examples of little things the Bills are not doing correctly, and these all contribute to why they are not winning. Outside of the special teams' TD, Bobby April's group was not very special again, and this is a troubling sign.

As the game entered the fourth quarter, it was only a matter of time before the depleted secondary woes would catch up with Buffalo, and that is when the flood gates opened.

Pierre Thomas, who sat out the first half due to dehydration, picked up over 100 yards rushing on 12 carries, including two impressive touchdown runs—all in the second half.

The Bills' defense carried the team again, but this was the first game that they were not able to score a touchdown of their own.

New Orleans' defense was strong most of the day, and it was eerie to see two ex-Bills, Jabrari Greer and Anthony Hargrove making plays for the opposition. Greer stepped up to break up a pass to Terrell Owens that resulted in Trent Edwards only interception on the day. That was a turning point play in the game.

Now the Bills head down to winless Miami Dolphins (0-3). The Bills received some bad news that two of their defensive secondary starters Donte Whitner and Leodis McKelvin are probably going to be out with injuries suffered in the Saints contest. The Bills are already without MLB Paul Posluszny and have lost starting TE Derek Schouman and starting tackle Brad Butler.

Based on how serious these new injuries turn out to be, it will be interesting to see if the Bills do add some veteran talent, or keep replacing starters by adding new players off of other teams' practice squads, like they did last week when they plucked Jamon Meredith away from Green Bay. At some point (maybe right now), the dropoff in talent level is too much to overcome when you try to fix a hole with one inexperienced player after another.

On the plus side, the Bills will welcome back Marshawn Lynch after he sat out the first three games due to his league suspension. Freddy Jackson has demonstrated that he is a quality back and is capable of handling the load by himself in consecutive weeks.

He is probably a little banged up, so some sort of rotation between Lynch and Jackson should mean that both players are able to stay fresher as the season wears on.

In addition, defensive back Drayton Florence played in his first game, and his return is timely due to the secondary injuries. Youngsters Jairus Byrd and Reggie Corner will need to step up on Sunday to plug in the holes along with Florence in the secondary.

From reports earlier today, it appears that Miami QB Chad Pennington is going to miss the rest of the season due to the shoulder injury he suffered against the Chargers yesterday. This will force Miami to play inexperienced Chad Henne at quarterback.

His inexperience will be a wash against the Bills' depleted defensive backfield, so it then will fall on the shoulders of Van Pelt, Edwards, Owens, Lynch, Jackson, and Evans to score some points against the Dolphins' defense if they want to get back to .500 record. Think the Dolphins had any scouts at the game Sunday?