Tyrod Taylor got the Bills back in the playoff hunt

The Buffalo Bills have a winning record again after a 16-10 win over the Kansas City Chiefs, a win that puts the team right back in the thick of the race for an AFC Wild Card berth.

The win was mostly thanks to a suffocating performance by the Buffalo defense that held Kareem Hunt to just 17 rushing yards on 11 attempts and iced the game with an interception on Alex Smith in the final minutes. But it was helped by the return of Tyrod Taylor to the lineup after the veteran was benched in Week 11.

In his return as a starter, Taylor completed 19 of 29 passes for 183 yards with one touchdown and no interceptions. He also added 27 rushing yards. It wasn’t a huge day statistically, but it was efficient and mistake-free, which was exactly what the Bills needed to get a much-needed win.

“I just thought overall today, we played good team offense,” Bills coach Sean McDermott said. “I thought Tyrod used his feet, at times, and we had some critical third-down conversions on some drives. There were some good things there and it wasn’t just one guy — it was spread out across the offense.”

A week ago, it was Nathan Peterman in the starting lineup for the Bills. The rookie fifth-round pick threw five interceptions in the first half against the Los Angeles Chargers, digging a hole that was too deep for Taylor to have any chance of digging out of in the last two quarters.

The Bills gave up 54 points to the Chargers and were struggling to stop opposing running games. But with the defense looking more like the one that held its first five opponents of the year to 20 points or fewer, all the Bills offense needed to do was avoid errors and get enough points to win.

Taylor showed that he’s the man for that job.

With the win, the Bills moved to 6-5 and into the second AFC Wild Card spot. They could get bumped by the Baltimore Ravens, who own a tiebreaker over Buffalo and will attempt to improve to 6-5 on Monday in a game against the Houston Texans. There’s also the 5-6 Cincinnati Bengals and 5-6 Los Angeles Chargers in the mix.

The problem is that the Bills face the New England Patriots twice in the last five weeks, beginning with a Week 13 battle in Buffalo. Other than those matchups, the Bills face the Miami Dolphins twice and the Indianapolis Colts in Week 14.

If the Bills are going to win that battle and get in the postseason for the first time since 1999, it’ll be on Taylor to lead the way.