New York Jets (3-13) at Buffalo (11-5)
Sunday, 4:25 p.m. EST, CBS.
BetMGM NFL odds: Bills by 7.
Against the spread: Jets 7-8-1; Bills 7-9.
Series record: Bills lead 72-58.
Last meeting: Bills won 30-10 on Sept. 14, at the Meadowlands.
Last week: Jets lost to Patriots 42-10; Bills lost to Eagles 13-12.
Jets offense: overall (28), rush (7), pass (32), scoring (28)
Jets defense: overall (23), rush (27), pass (16), scoring (30)
Bills offense: overall (5), rush (2), pass (18), scoring (6).
Bills defense: overall (8), rush (29), pass (1), scoring (12).
Turnover differential: Jets minus-19; Bills plus-1.
Jets player to watch
QB Brady Cook. The undrafted rookie will make his fourth consecutive start to end the season for the Jets. Cook, who got the opportunity to play because of injuries to Tyrod Taylor and Justin Fields, is looking to finish on a positive note and potentially establish himself as a backup option for the future. Through four games, including three starts, Cook has thrown for 679 yards with one touchdown and seven interceptions while averaging just 5.2 yards per passing attempt.
Bills player to watch
QB Mitch Trubisky. Josh Allen, who is nursing a sore right foot, was deemed “good to go,” by coach Sean McDermott, but the starter isn’t expected to play much. He’s likely to take the first snap to extend his starting streak to 122 games, the NFL’s longest active among quarterbacks. That puts backup Trubisky in position to oversee the offense in an outing the Bills have little more than playoff seeding on the line. The ninth-year player is 3 of 6 for 54 yards in three appearances this season. The Bills don’t have another QB on their roster or practice squad.
Key matchup
RB James Cook vs. Jets run defense. With an opportunity to win the NFL’s rushing title, Cook is likely to get a few chances to increase his league-leading 1,606 yards rushing. Cook enters the weekend 47 yards ahead of Indianapolis’ Jonathan Taylor, and 137 ahead on Baltimore’s Derrick Henry. In the teams’ September meeting, Cook had 132 yards rushing and scored twice.
Key injuries
Jets: RB Breece Hall (knee) was limited Thursday and Friday after sitting out practice Wednesday. … RB Isaiah Davis (concussion), TE Mason Taylor (neck), OL Xavier Newman (knee), CB Qwan’tez Stiggers (knee) and DL Micheal Clemons (ankle) and TE Jelani Woods (hamstring) are out.
Bills: McDermott has already ruled out LB Terrel Bernard (calf), DT DaQuan Jones (calf) and S Jordan Poyer (hamstring). … Other players on the injury report bear monitoring with the Bills expected to be cautious before the playoffs. They include DE Joey Bosa (hamstring) and TE Dalton Kincaid (knee).
Series notes
The Bills have won nine of 11 and four straight in which they’ve outscored the Jets by a combined 127-50. … Buffalo has won five straight at home since a 13-6 loss on Dec. 29, 2019, in a regular-season finale the playoff-bound Bills rested many of their starters. The home-winning streak is the Bills’ longest since winning six straight spanning 1963-68, during the franchises’ AFL era. … The Bills have dominated the series by going 17-7 in their past 24 meetings. … Buffalo has not allowed the Jets to score a TD on their opening drive in 24 straight outings — the NFL’s longest active streak.
Stats and stuff
The Jets are trying to end the season by stopping a four-game losing streak. It’s the second consecutive season during which New York has had two skids of at least four games. … New York set an NFL record for point differential for the month of December with minus-107 after being outscored 153-46 in four games. … The Jets became the fifth team in NFL history to lose four straight by 23 or more points in one season, joining the 1972 Patriots, 1954 Redskins, 1934 Cincinnati Reds and 1923 Oorang Indians. … New York will try to prevent becoming the first team in NFL history to go an entire season without an interception. The Jets already have the record for most consecutive games without an INT with 16. … Hall has 1,065 yards rushing for the first 1,000-yard season of his four-year career. He’s the eighth Jets player to get 1,000 yards rushing and the first since Chris Ivory in 2015. … WR Garrett Wilson leads the Jets with 395 yards receiving, despite having not played since Nov. 9 because of a knee injury that landed him on season-ending injured reserve. Wilson’s last reception came on Oct. 12. … S Malachi Moore has 85 total tackles, the fourth most by a Jets rookie defensive back since 2000. He needs four more to surpass Erik Coleman (2004) and Darrelle Revis (2007) for second most. … K Nick Folk has made 99 consecutive field goals under 40 yards, the longest streak by any NFL kicker in the past 40 years. … The Bills play their final regular-season game at Highmark Stadium, which they opened with a 9-7 win over the New York Jets in 1973. The team is relocating across the street to its new $2.1 billion home, which will also be called Highmark, with construction scheduled to be completed by June. … Since 1973, Buffalo is 246-162 at home, though that includes nine games played outside of Orchard Park, New York. … Buffalo has qualified for the playoffs for a franchise-record seventh straight year and enters the weekend as the AFC’s seventh and final seed. The Bills can finish no better than fifth, and will open the playoffs on the road for the first time since 2019, when they lost 22-19 in overtime at Houston. … Buffalo’s 2,503 yards rushing this season ranks fifth on the team list, and most since finishing with 2,630 in 2016. The remaining three top finishes happened during 14-game seasons in the 1970s. … With 5,927 yards offense, the Bills are 73 from reaching the 6,000 mark for a sixth consecutive season. … Cook has an opportunity to become Buffalo’s first player to be the NFL’s rushing leader since O.J. Simpson did so four times, the last in 1976. … With two TDs rushing last weekend, the 29-year-old Allen became the NFL’s first player to score 300 (passing, rushing and receiving) before turning 30. … In their previous meeting, Buffalo limited the Jets to 154 yards while New York went 0 of 11 on third down opportunities. The Jets also went 0 of 11 on third down in a 32-6 loss to Buffalo on Nov. 19, 2023.
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AP NFL: https://apnews.com/hub/nfl
The Associated Press
