The Buffalo Bills: Blind to Conservative Football?

Watching the Bills defensively dominate the Dallas Cowboys (throughout most of the game) on October 8, 2007, not only shocked the bookies in Vegas, but embarrassed the high-powered offense led by the Dallas QB, Tony Romo. In fact, prior to the game if you were to play any odds on Romo actually throwing more than two interceptions against the struggling Bills, any Vegas sportswriter would assail you with criticism.

After watching three quarters of play with Romo accruing four interceptions and the Buffalo defense containing Dallas with an agile secondary, most football enthusiasts were shocked. Not only did Buffalo effectively halt the Dallas attack, giving up only one touchdown in three quarters, but were able to amass three touchdowns through Special Teams and interception-touchdowns or (Pick-6's).

The efforts of the Buffalo defense were astounding, but the Bills 4th quarter offensive play calling largely extinguished the hope of any Buffalo upset. One play in particular should have been completely erased from the playbook:

The Bills were running their red-zone offense on the Dallas Cowboy 11-yard line with 6:21 left in the game. The drive was led by the Buffalo quarterback Trent Edwards, and the Bills were up 24 to 16.

Here is where the drama pauses. Where was the coaching in Buffalo? Granted it was 3rd down. Granted, it is every coach's purpose to establish confidence in a young quarterback by taking such risks as going for it on 4th down and passing on a 3rd and 20. The decision here however, was nothing less than foolhardy.

If the Bills would have kicked a chip-shot field goal on third down, instead of choosing an awkward pass play, the score would have been 27 to 16; effectively requiring Dallas to make two scores (A TD and a field goal). A difficult feat considering how stingy the Bills defense was playing (this point was later proved when the Bills denied the Cowboys a 2-point conversion). Such a strategy would have likely poised the Bills to eat up substantial time on the clock and they would have avoided a costly Trent Edwards interception that totally altered the above scenario.

In sum, although coaches presently loathe field goals on third downs, not only for lost opportunities, but because of the perceived emotional degradation of a QB, such strategies certainly deserve more analysis as seen above. Sure, second-guessing a pass-play can go either way, but in the case of Buffalo, they had not put a touchdown on the board via offense the whole day. Killing the Cowboys with defense was where the solution existed, but alas the coaches went with pipe-dreams of a Buffalo offense that could deal a TD blow.