For some Bills players, the frustration Monday night extended beyond the end of the fourth quarter.
Buffalo had its lunch money stolen by New England in primetime. With first place in the AFC East on the line, the Patriots quite literally ran over the Bills in what was a statement game for Bill Belichick’s team. Many would call the outcome of the Week 13 contest embarrassing for Buffalo, but some members of the Bills — namely Jordan Poyer and Micah Hyde — would push back on that notion.
Poyer and Hyde, somewhat understandably, took their frustration out on a member of the media after the game. Stephen A. Smith seems to believe those feelings should have been handled in a different manner.
“They threw three passes. They ran 48 plays and 45 of them were running plays and somehow, someway you ended up losing a game on your home turf,” Smith said Tuesday on ESPN’s “First Take.” “Again, if it were me as a reporter, I wouldn’t have asked a question like that. I would have asked, ‘How do you feel about the fact that they threw the ball just three times the whole game and beat you?’ Explain that. I wouldn’t have thrown it out like that. The flip side to it is that, if you Micah Hyde, you Poyer and those boys, you got to look in the mirror and understand that this team has owned the AFC East for the last 20 years basically, with the exception of last year.
“You get to the AFC Championship Game last year. You walk into last night’s game behind the New England Patriots who are now in first place after the year that they had last year. They have a rookie quarterback and it seems to have regained what they had over the previous 20 years as it pertains to y’all. So it’s real easy to point the finger at the media and say, ‘Yo, c’mon, man. All of that ain’t necessary.’ It’s a lot harder to look yourself in the mirror and acknowledge the fact that it might not be your fault because as a defense you did only give up 14 points, but in the end, you ended up walking with your head down in defeat at the hand of this same franchise. You might want to look at yourself before you look at the media. Although, again, if I was a member of the media in attendance for that game I would not have asked that question.”
Fortunately for the Bills, they won’t have to wait long to see the Patriots again. Buffalo and New England are set to meet Dec. 26 for a Week 16 clash that very likely will have playoff implications.
