Written by Mykail Mereau
Here we go again, Allen vs Mahomes yet again for a fourth time in the postseason and tenth meeting in their careers for a chance to make trip down to New Orleans to compete for the Lombardi Trophy. Here’s the game preview between the best two quarterbacks in the league.
Will Josh Allen have his 2006 Peyton Manning moment in Arrowhead on Sunday?
It’s no question that the rivalry Josh Allen and Patrick Mahomes has been the best quarterback rivalry since Tom Brady and Peyton Manning. It has been outgoing rivalry since the beginning of this decade when the two quarterbacks met back in 2020 during the COVID season. Now just like Peyton, Allen has yet to get the monkey off his back against Mahomes in the playoffs. He’s 0-3 against him in their postseason meetings, losing twice in the divisional round (on the road & at home) and losing once in the conference championship game. That’s where Josh Allen is at this point in his career being the shadow of his arch rival in Patrick Mahomes very similar to what Peyton Manning was to Tom Brady during the earlier days of their great rivalry. Manning was down 0-2 against Brady in the playoffs, losing to Brady twice on the road in the divisional round and conference championship, but it was until the 2006 NFL postseason where Manning and Brady met again in the postseason this time with Brady coming to Peyton’s house in Indianapolis for a trip to the Super Bowl in the Miami Gardens at the time. And Peyton finally overcame his kryptonite in a epic conference championship game and led the Colts to a Super Bowl win over the Chicago Bears. So will the same thing happened with Josh Allen on Sunday in Arrowhead and his own 2006 Peyton Manning moment against his arch rival Patrick Mahomes? I mean it could very well happened, but it won’t be easy especially since he has to go on the road and do it in a hostile environment like Arrowhead the loudest stadium across the National Football League. But if he losses again against Patrick Mahomes in the playoffs a lot of folks in the national media will have questions about Josh Allen ever reaching a Super Bowl in his career and getting past Patrick Mahomes to get to the big game. So we will find out after Sunday night in Arrowhead if Allen can finally get past his arch nemesis to get his first Super Bowl appearance and Buffalo’s first time back in the big game since 1994? or does Mahomes continue his dominance against Allen and goes to his fifth Super Bowl trying to make NFL history becoming the first NFL team to ever have a three peat? We shall see folks.
Who replaces the injured Taylor Rapp in the Buffalo secondary?
On Friday, head coach Sean McDermott announced that safety Taylor Rapp will be out for the game on Sunday against the Chiefs due to an hip injury he suffered during the divisional round win over the Baltimore Ravens. Now without the Rapp in the secondary who replaces him heading into this game. Well for starters you would probably assume that the Bills coaching staff will go towards starting Micah Hyde in the secondary with his veteran leadership and his experience being in these big games like this. But something says that Bills coaching staff might give the rookie safety Cole Bishop a shot in the secondary on Sunday. Buffalo drafted Bishop in the second round of last year’s draft and one of his great traits of his playing making abilities on how well he covers tight ends in the secondary. It happens that their opponent has a superstar tight end who one day will enter the hall of fame in Travis Kelce who’s been the achilles heel to this Bills secondary over the last three playoff matchups. Now it’s unfair to Bishop having his task being slowing down a future Hall of Famer like Kelce throughout the game since his rookie after all. But in a game like this is where you make a name of yourself and introduce yourself to the national audience around the world. So we will see on what decision that McDermott will make by Sunday whether he will go with his veteran player Micah Hyde or the rookie Cole Bishop being the starting safety for the Bills secondary in the absence of Taylor Rapp.
Can the Bills defense hold off Patrick Mahomes throughout the game?
In the last three postseason meetings Patrick Mahomes has had his way against the Bills defense, throwing for nine touchdowns and zero turnovers in total. Buffalo’s defense has been one of the reasons of blame falling short against Kansas City, including the infamous 13 seconds game where Josh Allen drove the Bills down the field for a potential game winning touchdown within 13 seconds left on the clock leaving enough time for Patrick Mahomes getting his team in field goal range and sending the game into overtime and Mahomes got the ball in overtime and the rest is history from that point on. As much as this has to be a game for Josh Allen, it also has to be a game for the Bills defense indefinitely. When the game gets tight heading into the final minutes of the fourth quarter and the Bills have the lead and the ball is in Patrick Mahomes hands potentially having another game winning drive in his career, the defense has to find a way to hold off Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs offense in crunch time. If not then Patrick Mahomes will advance to his fifth Super Bowl appearance and sending Buffalo home for a fourth time in the last five years. Everyone is depending on Josh Allen to show up and being hero to the NFL world and preventing the Chiefs threepeat in this game, but who really needs to show up in this game not named Allen is the Buffalo Bills defense.
Final Prediction: Bills 31, Chiefs 27
