ORCHARD PARK — Christian Benford doesn’t usually have much to say. But he said enough to get the normally mild-mannered Saquon Barkley riled up after the third play of the game.
Barkley is a beast most teams are careful not to poke. More often than not, the Philadelphia Eagles running back is going to come out ahead in any battle he faces.
But Benford wanted to let the Eagles know he was there. And the Bills kept coming all game long, delivering a performance that normally wins teams games.
The defending Super Bowl champions, an offense littered with Pro Bowlers, was stifled and often stumped. Super Bowl MVP Jalen Hurts went 0 of 7 in the second half and the Eagles only had one first down.
The Bills outgained the Eagles 331-190, the third-fewest yards allowed by the Bills this season. It was likely the best performance by Buffalo’s defense this season, holding the Eagles to a season-low in yardage.
And yet the Bills lost 13-12 thanks to a sputtering offense, a blocked extra point and a missed two-point conversion. But for the Bills defense — whether it was Cole Bishop, Taron Johnson or Shaq Thompson — the reason was a failure on their part to get a takeaway.
“There’s times where the offense bails us out,” Johnson said. “So it’s nothing. We just got to figure it out together.”
Through Week 4, the Bills set an NFL record by going 26 games without losing the turnover battle. With an egregious Josh Allen fumble — one that seemed like a forward pass but still should have been thrown away sooner — the Bills have lost the turnover battle six times this season.
Turnovers can be an overrated statistic because it’s more about what happens after the turnover that matters most. But the Bills have gone from a plus-24 turnover margin last year to plus-1 this season. And they are 10-0 when they don’t lose the turnover battle and 1-5 when they don’t.
In five losses, they have been outscored 33-7 in points off turnovers. And of the 15 giveaways in those games, seven of them came in opponents’ territory and Allen is responsible for five.
But in wins, not only have the Bills only committed seven giveaways, but they have outscored opponents 81-17 in points off turnovers.
It’s been an odd season in general for the Bills because the offense and defense have rarely put together a complete game. The Bills are 4-1 when allowing at least 30 points and 1-4 when scoring 20 or less.
“I feel like there’s been rare times when we’ve all been firing at the same time,” Bishop said. “That’s going to be huge when we can and hopefully we can do it at the right time. We got stops today, but they had (one takeaway) and we had none. So we’ve got to take the ball away, we’ve got to put our offense on the field in good positions.”
Still, the defense played well enough to win. In fact, when the Bills hold teams under 20 points, the game is usually not even close.
Before losing to the Eagles, the Bills had won 28 consecutive games when allowing fewer than 20 points and they won those games by 19 points per game, with the last loss being 14-10 to the Patriots in December 2021. Allen has a big role in that, but the Bills are still 53-7 under coach Sean McDermott when holding teams under 20.
But to hold Barkley — the reigning NFL Offensive Player of the Year — to 68 yards on 3.6 yards per carry and to have all the second-half performances the defense has produced this season, it’s bizarre that they can’t have that success consistently.
There were moments in the second quarter when the Bills seemed like versions of the last three weeks when they allowed 28.3 points on 339 yards per game. But they also forced a season-high five three-and-outs, including four in the second half.
“We won on first down,” Thompson said. “… That changed into second long, second and medium and that turned into third and long for them. … I felt like we played well. We just got to go turnover for turnover.”