There are times in football when a unit is beaten so thoroughly that there isn't much it can do other than salute the other team for its performance.
That seemed to be the case for the San Francisco 49ers defense Monday night after giving up 449 yards and 31 first downs in a 34-24 loss to the Buffalo Bills in Glendale, Arizona.
The 49ers didn't offer much resistance to the Bills, whose only punt in the game came late in the fourth quarter. The Bills scored on seven consecutive possessions after turning the ball over on downs on their opening drive and fumbling the ball away on their second possession, while quarterback Josh Allen had one of the better performances of his career, throwing for 375 yards and four touchdowns on 32 of 40 passing.
In other words, everything was clicking for the Bills on offense, while nothing the 49ers did worked on defense.
"Honestly It felt like they were calling the perfect plays for everything we were dialing up," 49ers linebacker Fred Warner told reporters after the game. "They just did a great job on their end. We were trying different looks, different calls and we just couldn't get off the field."
Nothing the Bills did caught the 49ers by surprise, and there didn't seem to be anything the Bills showed on the field the 49ers didn't prepare for. The Bills just did everything better than the 49ers, and it showed in the final result.
"I think that's probably the worst part is we knew exactly what they were running," linebacker Dre Greenlaw said. "Just from head to toe. We just came up short. It's kind of a weird feeling, but we knew exactly what we were running."
The Bills made calls that made the 49ers pay for their plans on defense, while Allen made things more difficult with his ability to extend plays. The 49ers were able to sack Allen only once, which obviously wasn't enough.
"Obviously it didn't work out well," 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan said. "I know that we did blitz sometimes. When we get back to our hotel here in a second I'll find out how much. But when we did blitz he got away from it and made some big plays with some receivers running across the field. When we didn't, he just dinked and dunked it and got after us too. Our defense I think has been carrying us all year and has played really good this year. They (had) a big challenge today. We didn't play our best on D. That's why we had to on offense and special teams."
And as for Allen, he played at a level that made everything difficult to stop and left the 49ers impressed with what they saw.
"He was in good control of the game," cornerback Richard Sherman said. "He didn't pass up any easy looks. He didn't take any risky throws. The D-Line was doing everything they could and put a lot of pressure on him but he did a great job of evading and extending plays. You extend plays for four or five seconds and the coverage usually breaks down regardless of what you're in. So you've got to give him credit, man. He played a freaking fantastic game."
The 49ers, as Shanahan noted, have gotten quality defensive performances in several games this season despite having to deal with injuries to a number of key players. But Monday night simply wasn't their night. What happened in Arizona likely won't hurt the confidence the defense has in its potential, but it'll need to pick up the pieces and rebound quickly in order to have any chance of making one final push towards the postseason.
"We're a lot better team than what we displayed," Greenlaw said. "We know it was an important game. I think everybody felt good going into it. Just the outcome of it, you've got to give credit to them for doing a great job and executing their game plan."