Balanced Chiefs Perfecting BURST BALL – the Kansas City Chiefs are Super Bowl Champions. The Chiefs are Champions! Wow… I just had to say that again… it sounds so good. I just can’t get enough of saying it and hearing it. Plus, there are many good reasons they are champions. They can score in bunches and have that come-from-behind ability like no other team in memory. However, they don’t just come from behind, they do it in lightning quick fashion, call it Burst Ball. Although, when K.C. plays “Burst Ball” they’re not limited to 4th quarter quickie comebacks. The only other team that comes to mind in professional sports that could score in bunches like this, and do it quickly, is the 2018 Golden State Warriors. However, the Warriors were known as a 3rd quarter team scoring a high volume of the points right after the half. For the Chiefs, they could break out with 35 points at any moment, in the middle of a thunderstorm. In a piece written by Benjamin Hoffman for the NY Times, called “How the Chiefs Beat the 49ers to Win the Super Bowl” he states:
“Comebacks have become the Chiefs signature. Sunday’s victory was the third comeback of 10 or more points by Mahomes and the Chiefs during this postseason — an N.F.L. record….”
Name another team in NFL history that could throw an avalanche of points at an opponent at will. Then, be able to do that game after game. The Warriors are the only Pro team that comes to mind. NFL.com’s Dan Hanzus wrote in his year ending Power Rankings:
“Media Research: Mahomes was 5-0 this season (including playoffs) when trailing by 10-plus points at any point in the game. The Chiefs are the first team to win the Super Bowl after trailing by 10-plus points in every one of their playoff games … and they won all three games by more than 10 points. Special, special stuff.”
So, the 2019 Chiefs have made a habit of making up ground and making it up quickly. These Kansas City Chiefs don’t just comeback… they come back with a vengeance. Consider:
Those numbers are staggering when you consider:
“The Chiefs down 24-0 to Houston.
The Chiefs down 17-7 to Tennessee.
The Chiefs down 20-10 to San Francisco.
After those deficits, in the three games combined, the Chiefs outscored their opponents 100-14.”
The Chiefs also owned the second quarter at every part of the 2019 season. Here’s how they did at different times of the year, in the second quarter:
It should be noted that to outscore your opponents by that margin, your defense has to be doing some things very right, and right for an extended period of each game. If you take a deep dive into the stats Paul Pulley has informed us of above, the Chiefs defense was holding opponents to a miniscule amount (14 points)… while affording the Offense the opportunity to fire away (100 points).
Without the stops the Chiefs defense was getting, that scoring differential would not, and could not, have happened. If you focus only on the Chiefs defense during those quarters when the offense was scoring 100… that includes: three plus quarters against the Texans, two and one-half plus quarters vs the Titans, and one-half a quarter vs the 49ers. That’s 14 total point allowed in more than a game and a half… or 9.33 points per game over that span. That should be seen as impactful as the 100 points scored.
Therefore, Burst Ball requires Balance. Without this balance between the offense and the defense, the Magic can’t happen. Every game would turn into a… Not-So-Okay-Corral Shootout.. like the game between the Chiefs and the Rams in 2018 in the Los Angeles Coliseum, a 51-to-54 loss. Or each game could turn out like the shootout a month before that to the Patriots in Foxborough, another loss: 40-to-43.
What makes this team special is… the Andy Reid-Patrick Mahomes led offense and their ability to score a load of points… plus… their Steve Spagnuolo-Tyrann Mathieu led defense which also sporadically slams the door shut on opposing teams.
It will be exciting to see what a whole season of the Spagnuolo-Mathieu defense can accomplish, as much as it will continue to be exciting to see what a Reid-Mahomes offense can do.
It’s no longer appropriate to speak about how amazing the Chiefs offense is without including the defense in that conversation. It was defender Kendall Fuller who made that late game interception to shut the door and lock the lock on the 49ers once and for all.
In the past, the Chiefs defense has been known as a “Bend-but-don’t-break” defense but now they should be thought of as a Down-and-Up Defense as in: “Wear-you-down-and-beat-you-up.” In the space and time when the offense was blowing up and taking the Super Bowl score from 10-20… to… 31-20, the defense was holding the 49ers to: 12 total plays, one punt, one turnover on downs, and one interception.
That’s a championship quality play by the defense, forcing the ball back into Mahomes hands. I’m a little weary of the old slogan: “Defense Wins Championships,” however, do you think that ism is in some way not true about this game? To review, the Chiefs defense produced the following drives by San Francisco while the Chiefs offense was scoring 21 points:
All in 12 plays. That’s astounding. Especially in a championship contest. Chiefs fans may be jumping in the streets because Patrick Mahomes is their quarterback — and rightfully so — however, Chiefs fans should also…
… Party Like It’s 1999 because of a defense that has played phenomenal football for more than two months now (BTW, I thought the Prince SB Halftime Show 13 years ago was one of the best ever).
ProFootball Focus not only noticed how well Patrick Mahomes played under pressure but pointed out the difference the Chiefs defense made in Super Bowl LIV:
“You can look at performance under pressure for both quarterbacks as one of the biggest deciding factors in the game. When the Chiefs’ pass rush hit home on Jimmy Garoppolo, he folded. Garoppolo completed just one of his nine attempts under pressure for 20 yards and two interceptions. The difference between how he handled the pocket breaking down compared to Mahomes is a big reason that Mahomes and the Chiefs were the ones lifting the Lombardi Trophy.”
What gets lost in the QB comparison there, is the performance of the Chiefs defenders who got a high volume of pressure on the 49ers QB keeping him rattled. Frank Clark was checked well for the first three quarters but during the burst in the 4th, he produced 2 pressures in 12 rushes.
A lot of pre-game talk was about how good the 49ers defense is but Mahomes was 5-for-5 when throwing to a WR covered by Richard Sherman. No other team has even thrown towards Sherman 5 times in a game this season. Sammy Watkins had a good day vs Sherman:
So, let’s take nothing away from the amazing performance by Patrick Mahomes while under pressure. Most of that was provided by the 9ers Nick Bosa:
Eric Fisher has become one of the better Left Tackles in the league but 49ers DE Nick Bosa almost single-handedly delivered a Super Bowl win for the 49ers. The Chiefs had their own super defensive performances like that of DB, Kendall Fuller, who was equally amazing:
The Chiefs defense played well together and the interception by Bashaud Breeland is a perfect example (shown below). DT Chris Jones put pressure on the 49ers’ QB, Jimmy Garoppolo, and then another Chiefs DT, Mike Pennel, got a good hit on Jimmy G. forcing a wobbly pass and eventual pick by Breeland:
Those hits seemed to add up for Jimmy Garoppolo whereas the hits the 9ers were getting on Patrick Mahomes didn’t appear to bother him, and he stayed as cool as a cucumber. Chiefs defenders had three of the top 6 grades by PFF in the Super Bowl.
Conclusion
In Burst Ball, one thing doesn’t happen without the other: both defense and offense are needed for that huge score discrepancy to take place. In the divisional game vs the Texans: how can the Chiefs score 6 straight unanswered touchdowns, without the defense answering the call every time the offense… didn’t have the ball? When you consider how many times the Chiefs have scored this season (also meaning: the number times the offense had the ball for a short period of time), it makes the defensive accomplishments even more pronounced.
The elevation of the defense in 2019 was made most clear by the honoring of Safety Tyrann Mathieu as Team MVP and I agree with Chiefs fan Ryan Landreth completely:
The Chiefs offense was 4th in total points scored… while their defense was 7th in total points allowed. That’s a winning combination. That also makes the Kansas City Chiefs defense one of the best defenses in 2019. It also meant… the Chiefs could win the Super Bowl…. and they did. The Chiefs won the Super Bowl (you know I love saying that). They did so with a burst here, and a burst there, and a burst everywhere. On both sides of the ball. Long live Burst Ball.
Laddie Morse — ArrowheadOne
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