Buffalo Bills at Pittsburgh Steelers: Big questions to answer in Week 13

The Buffalo Bills are currently the seven seed in the AFC Playoff picture. Their opponents on Sunday, the Pittsburgh Steelers, are currently the four seed, and lead the AFC North Division. With a win, the Bills will maintain their current pace in the playoff picture regardless of what happens with other teams, and they may even gain in the standings. With a loss, they risk falling out of the playoff picture altogether.

The stakes are fairly clear for Buffalo. They need a win badly. After dropping a 23-19 game at the Houston Texans last Thursday night, the Bills need to bounce back, and fast, if they wish to keep the dream of winning a Super Bowl alive.

Will a loss on Sunday eliminate Buffalo from playoff contention? No, it will not. Will it make their road much more difficult moving forward? Yes, it will.

As if the stakes weren’t high enough on their own, the Bills are dealing with myriad injuries, as well. Given that they were already bitten pretty hard by the proverbial injury bug, adding more possible missed games to their ledger isn’t ideal. However, it’s a reality that the Bills face.

In order to come out of Pittsburgh with a much-needed AFC victory, the Bills will need some big performances from their key players. Here are five (or so) Bills to watch this week._____________________________________________________________________________

QB Josh Allen

It’s going to take an efficient, turnover-free performance from Josh Allen to win on Sunday. If the Bills can avoid turnovers, it’s likely that their offense will have enough juice to score more than the Steelers. If Buffalo gives Pittsburgh extra possessions, it’s likely that they won’t have enough firepower to overcome those extra attempts.

Last Thursday night, Allen was battered and bruised all night long. He held the ball forever while waiting in vain for his receivers to come open, and as a result, Houston’s ferocious pass rush was able to beat him up to the tune of eight sacks, a career high. Just one week prior, he looked decisive and efficient against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, and while he still held the ball plenty, he made plays downfield. Such is the catch-22 of Allen’s play style, as those off-schedule plays are what make him elite, but when there are no off-schedule plays to be found, it can keep the offense well behind the sticks.

Entering the week, no team had allowed more passing yards than Pittsburgh. While they may have linebackers J.J. Watt and Alex Highsmith, and a ferocious pass rush, they have not been anything close to a solid pass defense this season. Buffalo has no excuses this week, as they’ll need to move the ball effectively through the air.

WR Brandin Cooks

Hello, new friend! What will the veteran’s role be this week? The team released wide receiver Elijah Moore, wide receiver Curtis Samuel is now on Injured Reserve (IR) with elbow and ankle injuries, and Gabe Davis just signed to the 53-man active roster. As such, the likelihood that Cooks not only dresses for the game, but plays significant snaps, is greater than I’d have guessed when the signing was announced on Tuesday.

At worst, Cooks can come in for a few plays to run the safeties off the middle level. At best, perhaps he and Allen have had enough time to discover some sort of rhythm with each other. While the latter might be wishful thinking, for a veteran like Cooks, coming into a new place and trying to contribute quickly isn’t anything new or impossible. The new No. 18 has a chance to impact the game right away.

[The Offensive Tackles]

Who is going to play tackle? Neither right tackle Spencer Brown nor left tackle Dion Dawkins will play, as both have already been ruled out thanks to a shoulder injury and a concussion, respectively. Offensive linemen Alec Anderson and Ryan Van Demark are ostensibly the next men up on the depth chart, with rookie Chase Lundt a likely swing tackle, but Tylan Grable beat Van Demark out for a gig last year, and the second-year man returned to practice this week after spending the entire season to date on IR due to a concussion.

No matter how you slice it, the Bills are in trouble here, as the team and offensive coordinator Joe Brady often ask their offensive linemen to win one-on-one against opposing pass rushers. Perhaps the injury situation will necessitate a different plan this week, but missing Brown and Dawkins up front also negatively impacts the run game. Buffalo needs some reserves to come up big on Sunday, and there’s no position where they need it more than offensive tackle.

DT T.J. Sanders

I don’t want to kick a guy while he’s down or make sweeping judgments about a player who’s only six games into his pro career, but Buffalo’s 2025 second-round pick has been a complete non-factor so far in every game he’s played. Sanders didn’t show much before he suffered a knee injury that required surgery and an IR stint, but since returning, he’s been manhandled at the point of attack repeatedly. Granted, thanks to a roster imbalance, he’s been forced to play some snaps at defensive end, but the fact remains that there are more examples of Sanders being erased from a play and bulldozed into his own teammates, thereby erasing them from the play as well, than there are examples of him making an impact on defense.

If the Bills are going to continue having him suit up in the middle, and they have to thanks to the injuries they have along the defensive line, he just has to be better. Sanders offered the kind of athletic promise that led general manager Brandon Beane to assume that he would be a solid force rushing the passer up the middle, but so far, he’s been a liability in the run game and a ghost in the pass game.

With Ed Oliver injured, it’s been another rookie—fourth-round pick Deone Walker — who has stepped up and shown out, but some sort of positive contribution from Sanders as he rotates in would go a long way towards helping Buffalo’s run defense to improve.

CB Taron Johnson

Johnson is a veteran who, for a time, could have made an argument for being the top slot corner in football. As Buffalo played nickel almost exclusively, Johnson ran as both a fifth defensive back and a third linebacker. The hits he’s taken while filling that latter role were bound to catch up with him, and this year, it seems that’s true.

Johnson has been a step slow this year, and while I won’t go as far as calling him a liability on defense, for the first time, I’ve started to agree that there might be other options on the roster who can do his job better than he has done it. How often will the Bills stick with their nickel looks as Pittsburgh goes into heavier sets? Will Johnson come off the field in favor of a linebacker like Dorian Williams? Might the Bills consider using Johnson on some fire blitzes from the edge, something they haven’t done much of with their nickel corner this season?

A good outing from Johnson this week would likely mean that Pittsburgh’s leading receiver — running back Kenneth Gainwell, who has 42 receptions on the year — would be kept in check in the passing game. That’s something that the Bills need to ensure if they’re going to keep a middling Steelers offense stuck in neutral.