Chiefs Don’t Have A Good Defense
by Frank Leggio
Yup, a little click bait to bring you in, but the Chiefs don’t have a good defense, or a good offense, or a good special teams. It dawned on me after reading lots of commentary on many boards before and after games that many commentators base their opinion of which team will win on a comparison of an offense and a defense. Defense A is better than Offense B or something of the like. I think the game is so much more complex than that, so even allowing for some simplification of purposes for discussion: it is still over-simplified. Impacts of injuries, the right play call at the right time, individual match-ups, second level comparisons (Offense A vs Defense B for example). We really need to take a more holistic approach in the evaluation, not which offense or defense is better, but which TEAM is better. The Kansas City Chiefs have a great team this year.
Here we sit, 12 games into the season, and we have won 9 of them. It is usually a defensive or special teams driven game, with just enough offense at the right moment to win. It isn’t a flashy offense or a high scoring offense. It is productive when needed. The special teams plays well and controls field position mostly, but has scored or created a turnover when needed. The defense gives up more yardage than you could think possible, but it also makes the other team pay dearly for mistakes.
In reading some blogs this last week, I ended up connecting with an opposing team’s board at Falcoholics. I was struck by the lack of respect the Falcons fans were giving us. We get enough of a lack of respect from everyone as it is, but the Falcons? Let’s be serious, they have little room to talk with their play.
Here are a few excerpts (I haven’t posted the usernames, I am sure those guys are glad). I am not showing these as a specific rebuttal to Atlanta fans, but just as examples of what we have been seeing for a long time. These could be on any board before a game, I just didn’t feel like digging.
THE POSTS
This one completely discounts our defense because their offense is too good to stop. This assumes we play like everyone else they have played. Our defense is bend don’t break and is pretty tough inside the 20. They also tend to get a lot of turnovers and score off of many of them. In hindsight, despite 12 miles of penalties, we still held them below their average, forced mistakes, and won the game.
“Jacks just being Jack
Hes just very poetic. Hes right tho. Our offense is just too good to stop, weve heard 1000 times this season about good defenses being able to slow us down, but only Phili did that because they commited completely to the run game and controlling ToP. Weve made awesome defenses look mediocre all year. As for our D, were pretty terrible in the first half, but by the second half, we actually start to look serviceable amd will actually make a few key stops. Its hard for us Falc fans to real say how good they are tho cuz we forgot what good defense looks like”
Here we have a Falcon fan pointing out numbers, trying to compare competition, etc. It is ironic in that they seem to have ignored our numbers. We seem to have many teams that ignore what our team does. Whether that is turnovers, or return yardage, or high completion percentages, we keep winning games because of these types of factors. I don’t think I have read much where I thought Chief fans were complaining about injuries. I have read where they were mentioned, but it was in a next man up context. The writer was talking about how we could maintain the performance even with injuries.
“I just find it amusing a few chiefs fans that are commenting here IGNORE the numbers and facts. I hopped over and read some of their comments and they are way of base. One of my favorites was that Atlanta has NO pass rush…. but we are tied in Sacks and have a player (vic Beastly) on the top of the list in Qb pressures and sacks….. I know they have more pass rush “stars” but it hasn’t translated on the numbers. Congratulations you beat the raiders at their home (so did we), congrats you beat the saints at your home (we went into the dome and blew them out), and you beat the chargers… well really the chargers gave that game away, like they have many time this year. I hope if we win Sunday they all run back to their blog because I know they will be blaming “injuries”. So many “trolls” coming from their fan base, Philly wasn’t even this annoying and don’t they have the worse fans??”
I like this one too, as it hits so many knocks on us. Big loss to the Steelers. Over rated turnover defense. Play poor competition. Whatever, right? The Kansas City Chiefs continue to win games against top teams.
“No team has beaten us by double digits. Can you say that?
After Sunday we’ll have matching records and you can move on to the next opponents blog.
Your “opportunistic” defense is a whole lot of over rated thanks to a +7 against a terrible Jets team.
But hey, I can’t fault you for believing you can win. I’d have no respect for you if you conceded.”
I wanted to pull in these excerpts not to taunt/troll the Falcon fans or anything like that, but instead, wanted to talk more about how the Chiefs don’t get the respect they deserve after so many wins the last couple of years. While we have struggled in the playoffs, and can shoulder the criticism there, we have earned the respect of winning in the regular season. It would behoove teams to learn that this team comes to play. Not 59 minutes. Not 74 minutes. The full game.
In these examples you can also see the focus on just one phase of the game and how it will be the deciding factor. In the case of the Kansas City Chiefs, they aren’t one-dimensional. They win by a combination of all 3 phases of the game, taking what is given and trying to focus strengths on weaknesses.
Our game plan is to play conservative and get the other teams to make mistakes. This team takes those mistakes and tends to capitalize with points. They will take anything from a 2 point safety to a pick six touchdown. Or, to use a baseball term, small ball. Just keep chipping away a point at a time.
PICKING EACH OTHER UP
I am not a big baseball fan, but when I do watch, it is the Royals. As they entered the playoff scene after a 35-year hiatus, I started watching again. Often times, when watching the Kansas City Chiefs, I think about things I see or hear in Royals games. In this case, I am reminded of the saying “he picked him up”. It seems that when there is a mistake or just poor play, we come back and another player or phase of the game picks them up.
For instance, in the Atlanta game, their offense lights up our defense and scores a touchdown in an 8 play 5 minute drive. It starts to look like it is going to be a long game for the Chiefs. Instead the KC offense comes out and conducts a 4 play 2 minute touchdown drive to answer. Or, the offense stalls at mid field, special teams fakes a kick and scores touchdown. These are simply a few of the MANY examples of one area/player faltering and another stepping up. That step up then re-energizes the area/player that was faltering and we stay in the game.
I think this is a major difference than some of the past teams Kansas City has fielded. We are more complete overall. The defense is the heart and soul, but you don’t want to ignore the special teams and offense if you are playing us. They will make you pay more times than not.
A GREAT TEAM
As I started off this article, we don’t have a good defense, or offense, or special teams group… we have a great team. We shouldn’t worry about whether our offense can keep up with another offense. We shouldn’t worry about whether our defense can stop another offense (or vice versa). We also shouldn’t worry about whether we can win the field position game in special teams. The team plays rather complimentary football. I would think other teams should worry about how to deal with all three.
And there’s The Rub.
