The Niners will have to deal with Josh Allen
The struggling San Francisco 49ers must start stacking wins as soon as possible, with Sunday night teetering on must-win status.
It won’t be easy, though, as the 49ers travel to Buffalo to take on the 9-2 Bills. Buffalo is just two weeks removed from ending the Chiefs’ hopes of an undefeated season and extending its winning streak to six.
Buffalo is not only hot but also well-rested for Sunday. Buffalo is the fourth and final team the 49ers will face after their bye week this season.
With the calendar turning over to December, these are the numbers to know with the 49ers needing a win:
6.3
The Bills offense has turned the ball over on 6.3 percent of its drives, the fourth-best rate in the league.
After 11 games last season, the Bills were 6-5 and needed to improve to make the playoffs. Buffalo sits at 9-2 this season and has a clear path to the postseason. So what changed?
The Bills – and, most importantly, Josh Allen – have stopped turning the ball over.
All had 12 interceptions and five fumbles through Buffalo’s first 11 games of 2023. That obviously played a large role in the Bills having the fifth-worst turnover percentage at 14.9 percent.
The Bills have cut that percentage by over half this season because Allen has been more careful with the ball. Through 11 games this season, Allen has thrown only five interceptions with five fumbles. After an interception rate of 3.1 percent in 2023, Allen has cut it in half and is at a career-low rate of 1.5 percent.
San Francisco started the season hot in forcing turnovers. Before its bye, the 49ers had six games with at least two takeaways and only one game where it didn’t force a single turnover. In the three games since the bye, San Francisco has forced just one turnover and was held without a takeaway against Tampa Bay and Green Bay.
The 49ers defense is still ranked in the top ten in turnover percentage, forcing a turnover on 13.2 percent of drives, but has struggled in recent weeks. Last week, those struggles were apparent after a couple of bad throws from Jordan Love were dropped by San Francisco defenders.
Allen hasn’t made mistakes this season, so he won’t hand the ball over. The 49ers will have to force Allen into errors, which hasn’t happened in recent weeks.
4.9
Buffalo’s defense has allowed 4.9 rushing yards per attempt, the third-worst in the league.
Overall, Buffalo hasn’t been too bad against the run. It’s allowed 119.4 rushing yards per game, which is about the middle of the road, but they haven’t faced many rushing attempts. The Bills defense has faced an average of 24.5 attempts per game, the seventh-fewest faced by any defense.
It’s not as simple to do as said, but the 49ers need to run the ball as much as they can on Sunday.
Buffalo is one of the better teams in the league this season, so when they get ahead, it’s tough to run the ball. Look at the games where Buffalo has faced its fewest rushing attempts. Buffalo has faced 17 rushing attempts three times. Once was in the Bills 30-21 win over the Chiefs in a back-and-forth battle, which stands as an outlier. In the two other games where Buffalo faced 17 rushing attempts, they won by a combined score of 78-20
On the flip side, the most rushes Buffalo has faced in a game this season is 34, which has happened twice. The Bills beat the Dolphins back in Week 2 by a score of 31-10. Two weeks later, however, Buffalo allowed 271 yards on 34 attempts in the 35-10 loss to the Ravens.
It’s not as simple as running the ball a lot, but running it effectively. The 49ers can’t just run the ball 30 times at a three-yard average and expect to win. Conversely, expecting the 49ers to match the eight yards per attempt Baltimore accomplished back in September is silly.
Running the ball early and often but effectively, forcing some turnovers, and using some outside forces could help the 49ers pull off the upset in Buffalo.
42.8864° N, 78.8784° W
The coordinates for Buffalo, New York.
It’s time for a quick geography lesson. The further north or south you go from the equator, the colder it gets as you near either pole.
The 49ers head to Buffalo for Sunday night’s tilt against the Bills, but San Francisco will be battling not just the map but also the calendar.
Sunday marks the first day of December. And what happens when you mix Buffalo, New York, and December?
Cold weather.
The 49ers had potential for a cold weather game last week in the more northern Green Bay, WI, but that was a late afternoon game with a high of 44 degrees, practically shorts weather for the Packers faithful.
With the 49ers in prime time on Sunday, the game won’t start until around 8:20 p.m. EST. The forecast currently calls for it to be around 30 degrees around kickoff, and it will only get colder as the night progresses.
In recent years, some good 49ers teams have struggled with lesser teams because of the weather. The 2019 49ers struggled through a 9-0 win in Washington against a Washington team that would finish the season 3-13.
The 2022 49ers—who would finish at 13-4—dropped their opening game of the season to a Bears team that finished 3-14, with heavy rains playing a factor.
If some good 49ers teams have struggled with teams they should have easily beaten, maybe the Bills will have that same struggle on Sunday night with San Francisco.