Bills' offense flounders in third straight loss

I don’t want to shortchange the defensive effort by the Patriots, especially the play of the front seven, but the Bills offense continued to be anemic in a 20-10 loss to New England.

That makes three straight losses for the Bills, all to divisional opponents. In all three losses, Buffalo's offense has scored a total of three touchdowns. The Bills had just 168 total yards against the Patriots.

There was also some questionable play-calling by Buffalo. On its first drive in the third quarter, the Bills had third down and 1 near midfield when Trent Edwards threw an incomplete pass. When you’re having trouble moving the chains and all you need is one yard for a first down and your quarterback has been misfiring, you keep it on the ground.

But then, the Bills never established a running game. It’s tough to establish anything offensively when your defense can’t get off the field. The time of possession was lopsided -- the Patriots had the ball for 37:40. A good chunk of that was in the fourth quarter on a 19-yard touchdown drive by New England that took more than 9 minutes off the clock and put the game away.

A couple other items worth mentioning: On the Patriots opening drive, Bills DB Ko Simpson’s hit on Randy Moss was not vicious and did not warrant a 15-yard penalty for unnecessary roughness. I thought the Bills were victimized by another bad call later on the drive when the replay showed Wes Welker did not have two feet inbounds on a 21-yard completion.