rayonsports.com

The Buffalo Bills started the second half of the 2013 season at home against unbeaten Kansas City on Sunday the same way they’ve played for most of the first half. They played a competitive game, yet made enough mistakes to basically hand the Chiefs their ninth win, 23-13. Buffalo’s offense was handcuffed by having to use undrafted rookie Jeff Tuel at quarterback due to a rib injury suffered by Thad Lewis, who held the job the past few weeks because the regular starter, EJ Manuel, is also hurt. Tuel played well enough to give his team a chance to win, but his third quarter interception that Sean Smith returned 100 yards for a KC touchdown turned the game around. It was a 14 point swing that a young, unstable team like Buffalo has shown it is unable to overcome. That pick-six, along with T.J. Graham’s fourth quarter fumble that Tamba Hali scooped up and ran in for another TD, were the only touchdowns the Chiefs were able to score, and they were gifts courtesy of a Bills’ team that is starting to make plays like that a habit. Add in a block in the back penalty that wiped out a punt return touchdown by Leodis McKelvin early in the game, and you have the recipe Buffalo used on Sunday to put their season record at 3-6. The Bills’ defense held KC in check most of the day, with the only negative for that unit being Stephon Gilmore’s inability to cover anybody. Gilmore, since returning to the lineup from a broken wrist, has looked tentative and has actually become a target for opposing passers instead of the “lockdown” cornerback he’s supposed to be.

The Bills lost, and it’s disheartening, but there were a lot of positives in their effort against an unbeaten foe. Tuel, like Lewis, played well enough for his team to win, and his 59 yard TD pass to Marquise Goodwin was a thing of beauty. He kept drives alive all day with key third down conversions, but just couldn’t finish those drives, although some drops by his tight end Scott Chandler didn’t help his cause. The Bills’ running game, as usual, was impressive. Fred Jackson was his usual hard-running self, and the week off to rest his bad ankle did C.J. Spiller a world of good, as he rushed for 116 yards on only 12 carries and ripped off a couple of great long runs. The defense played another impressive game – Kiko Alonso and Jerry Hughes registered sacks, and Aaron Williams was a tackling machine in the secondary. Overall, they held the Chiefs to 210 total yards, while Buffalo’s offense amassed 470. The two six-point turnovers were the difference, and this game slipping away was not unlike the game against the Jets earlier in the year, when Rex Ryan’s team was penalized 20 times and still managed to beat the Bills. The Bills’ coaching staff needs to use the remaining 7 games in this season to reverse the team’s trend of finding ways to give away games, to stop beating themselves. To cut out costly penalties and turnovers. Until they do that, well, eventually the “young” team label will become the “losing” team label, the same one they’ve worn under the past four coaching staffs.