The Buffalo Bills Week 2 game against the Las Vegas Raiders can’t come soon enough after the team’s Week 1 overtime catastrophe. Ahead of this now a must-win game for Josh Allen and company, let’s make some bold Bills Raiders Week 2 predictions.

All this Bills needed to do was play it safe and steady after Aaron Rodgers went out and Zach Wilson came in for the New York Jets on the NFL’s Monday night opener. Instead, the Bills defense let up huge, gashing runs to Breece Hall, and Josh Allen threw three interceptions (all to Jordan Whitehead) and lost a fumble to keep the Jets in it. An overtime punt return later, the Bills started the season 0-1.

Across the country, Jimmy Garoppolo and the Raiders overcame a 16-10 fourth-quarter deficit to beat the Denver Broncos in Week 1. Las Vegas didn’t look great at times, but in the end, they did exactly what the Bills couldn’t do and got it done to pull out the win. If both teams play like they did last week, the Bills could be in trouble.

It’s only week two, but after the shocking loss on Monday, this already seems like a turning point tilt for the defending AFC East champs. With that in mind, here are three bold Bills-Raiders Week 2 predictions.

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3. Josh Allen gets it together

Week 1 was an unmitigated disaster for Josh Allen. For every good play he made with the ball Monday night, he seemingly made two bad ones. The QB threw into double coverage, bailed on plays early, and refused to slide or run out of bounds with the ball.

The quarterback play from Allen harkened back to his first year or two in the league where there were brief flashes of brilliance, but most of the football was out of control, and the decision-making was poor.

The first bold Bills-Raiders Week 2 prediction is that Josh Allen gets it together and plays better on Sunday because he has to. Another game like Monday would be absolutely devastating to the Bills.

There is a glass-half-full take on Allen’s play vs. the Jets where he was a little rusty, a little too amped up, and a little unfocused. He played terribly because of all that, he knows it, and that loss was the wake-up call he needed to get back to the MVP candidate Bills Mafia knows and loves.

For this prediction, we’re going to go with that because the alternative — that the hero ball and bad habits are now too engrained to shake — is too upsetting to think about. Against the Raiders, we’ll get our next hint as to what’s going on with the QB.

2. The Bills defense is still a work in progress

So, Josh Allen will snap back in Week 2 vs. the Raiders, but the defense is a little more complicated.

The run defense was atrocious against the Jets, the pass rush was just OK (and should have been better against a terrible offensive line), and star linebacker Matt Milano was the defensive equivalent of his QB. Milano made some spectacular plays but was also often out of position and overly aggressive chasing plays.

Head coach Sean McDermott is now calling the defense, as he did for the Carolina Panthers before getting the Bills job. In Week 1, his involvement in the D didn’t seem any better than Leslie Frazier, and maybe even worse at times.

No matter who is calling the D, the truth is the pass rush is still average without Von Miller, the second linebacker next to Milano is severely lacking, and the corners are fine, but 2022 first-round pick Kaiir Elam (a healthy scratch in Week 1) is a bust, which hurts the overall talent of the group.

The bold Bills-Raiders prediction here is simply that the issues stay the issues, and there are still some growing pains in Week 2.

The Raiders have an excellent back in Josh Jacobs, who will likely have a big game, and the Bills may struggle to cover two good tight ends — Austin Hooper and rookie Michael Mayer — because Milano can’t be everywhere.

Until Von Miller gets back, the defense is still just average.

1. Bills 31, Raiders 20

Despite all the issues, I’m still on the Bills bandwagon for at least one more week. If Allen gets it together and McDermott can scheme up the defense a little better, Buffalo can still be the powerhouse squad it’s been the last two seasons.

While there are talent issues across the roster after five years of mediocre drafts, the Bills still have more ballers than the Raiders, and that is what should help the team cruise to a relatively comfortable victory at the home opener in Orchard Park on Sunday.