Josh Allen prioritizes winning over flashy plays as 3-0 Bills prepare to host 0-3 Saints

ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. (AP) — Josh Allen enjoys electrifying crowds by completing deep passes as much as anyone. The Bills’ star quarterback is fine with boring, too, especially when accompanied by a win.

“You want to see fireworks, right? You want to see big plays and long touchdowns,” Allen said this week. “I love making those plays. But ultimately, I love winning football games.”

Though Allen’s strong and effective arm was on display when he rallied the Bills to a season-opening win over Baltimore, the NFL’s reigning MVP has been relegated to mostly attempting short passes and handing the ball off to James Cook the past two weeks.

But that’s been good enough for the Bills (3-0), who are playing with efficiency and poise in critical moments. In a sign of continued growth for the five-time defending AFC East champions, they are not beating themselves.

The Bills host the New Orleans Saints (0-3) on Sunday.

Buffalo’s offense has yet to commit a turnover this year, and counts just one in Allen’s past 13 starts, including playoffs. And the defense has produced big plays — two fourth-quarter takeaways — when needed.

“We’re not at our best whatsoever,” cornerback Taron Johnson said. “And being 3-0 is very encouraging because we still have a ways to go. And we’re gonna get there. And I’m excited to see us when we’re at our best.”

The Saints face a much longer developmental climb. Five years removed from record-setting quarterback Drew Brees’ retirement, they are starting over under first-year coach Kellen Moore.

New Orleans has dropped seven straight dating to last season, when Dennis Allen was fired following a 2-7 start, and is in jeopardy of its first 0-4 start since 2012.

Competitive as the Saints were in losing two one-score outings at home to open the season, the wheels fell off in a 44-13 loss at Seattle on Sunday. The Seahawks scored three TDs in the opening 11 minutes, including Tory Horton going untouched on a 95-yard punt return.

“Head down, back to work,” Moore said.

“I have a lot of confidence in those guys being able to respond the right way,” he added. “It’s not a time to panic or shift gears or completely flip the whole schedule around just to do that.”

There remain numerous factors working against the Saints.

The schedule, alone, has them going from the West Coast to the northeast, while facing a rested Bills team that had the weekend off after beating Miami on Thursday night. And New Orleans is playing in yet another rowdy environment — a place where the Bills have won 13 straight regular-season games.

“Another opportunity and we’ve got to have a better showing for sure,” said quarterback Spencer Rattler, who has yet to win in nine career starts. “We can’t beat ourselves. That’s what it starts with.”

Say what?

The noise at Highmark Stadium gets so loud at home, Johnson said Bills defenders resort to hand signals when they make pre-snap adjustments. Not that he’s going to complain or ask fans to pipe down, because the noise is having the same effect on opposing offenses.

“Nah, you don’t want the crowd to shut up,” Johnson said. “I feel like there’s times where we play better away, just for that reason alone.”

Pre-snap problems

The Saints enter Week 4 tied for first in the NFL with 31 accepted penalties — with a number of them involving pre-snap issues.

Having all five projected starting linemen healthy would help. Guard Trevor Penning missed the first two games with a foot injury, and right guard Taliese Fuaga missed last week with back and knee soreness.

“We can go down a couple rabbit holes with the pre-snap thing,” Moore said. “Our guys have put a lot of awareness to that this week and there’s a lot of accountability that’s going to be associated with that.”

Not rattled

Although Saints rookie quarterback Tyler Shough, a second-round draft pick out of Louisville, got snaps late against Seattle, Moore went out of his way to assure everyone Rattler remains the starter.

“Spence has been phenomenal,” Moore said. “He’s played plenty of good football in the first three weeks. I have a lot of confidence in Spence.”

Rattler has completed 67.2% of his passes for 639 yards and four TDs with one interception. Moore suggested that Rattler’s teammates could support him by avoiding mistakes that have put New Orleans in too many predictable passing situations.

Against the odds

BetMGM has the Bills favored by 16 1/2 points. It’s the largest spread for Buffalo since hosting Houston on Oct. 3, 2021, when the Bills were favored by up to 19 1/2.

Either way, Buffalo more than covered in that game, scoring 21 points in the fourth quarter to win 40-0.

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AP Sports Writer Brett Martel in New Orleans contributed to this report.

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