Chiefs Lose in Overtime And Their Season Comes to an End

Chiefs Lose in Overtime And

Their Season Comes to an End

by Laddie Morse | January 21, 2019

To sit and listen to another mindless field announcer ask Tom Brady what it means to him to go back to another Super Bowl is more than I can take. The Chiefs could have won this game many times over but the proactive game planning of the New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick, the pitiful game planning of the Kansas City Chiefs head coach Andy Reid, and the horrid calls by the referees was more than the players could overcome. After scoring no points in the first half the Chiefs came back to score 31 points in the second half. However, the Chiefs lose in overtime and their season comes to an end.

It’s hard ot blame the outcome of this game on the referress though because the Chiefs couldn’t do a thing in the first half. Had they taken advantage of any of their opportunities during that half, the outcome would have been very different. Although, if any of a number of referee calls had gone the Chiefs way… the Chiefs would have also won.

Perhaps the most telling tale of this game was ownership of the clock. The Pats had the ball for 43 minutes and 59 seconds while the Chiefs had it for 20:53. This not only points to the poor game planning by Andy Reid but zero in half adjustments both on the field and off.

Now I’m having to watch as the Lamar Hunt Trophy is given away — once again — to the owner of the Patriots, Robert Kraft and Bill Belichick. Sick feeling in my stomach. Four lead changes in the 4th quarter was hard enough to take but having the game end up in favor of the Patriots is decades of disappointment all rolled up into one moment… again.

While my acrimony for the New England Patriots is nothing new, it’s made worse by the longevity of their winning. In many ways I don’t believe they deserve a lot of the wins they’ve so-called “achieved.” What is more unforgivable is the lack of appropriate preparation by Andy Reid and his staff. They should never have had laid a goose eggs on the scoreboard in the first half. If they had scored at all, they likely are headed to the Super Bowl. I lay the responsibility for that on Andy Reid. Mostly.

Andy Reid, in his post game presser, said that he wants his players to remember the hurt, and let that help to motivate them so they don’t experience that again. I get what he’s saying but I’m tired of the “silver lining” statements, and this was one of those.

While I am wanting to stay away from a conversation about what the Chiefs need to do in the offseason, I am hoping they fire Defensive Coordinator Bob Sutton. Some might claim that the players lost the game on the field but Sutton had his players out of place and playing the wrong scheme too much of the time.

While replacing the DC “might” help, I wasn’t expecting to see the game look too big for Patrick Mahomes and that’s exactly how it looked in the first half. Not a good look for the man who would be MVP. Three Punts and 16 total offensive plays was what the offense produced in the first half. In-game adjustments are the responsibility of the HC as well as the QB and both were failing miserably. The second half, adjustments had obviously been made, by both the offense and the defense.

The Chiefs D gave up 524 total yards including 176 yards rushing. Sony Michel had 113 yards on the ground and that was as much due to the wrong personnel being on the field as to Tom Brady switching plays whenever the Chief presented the wrong personnel. That’s exactly the problem Bob Sutton was facing but it is one that could be overcome with better personnel, which is why GM Brett Veach also has some skin in this loss.

As far as Brett Veach goes, there are moves I would have made but he didn’t. I would have traded for Safety Earl Thomas the week before he broke his leg. Ha-Ha Clinton Dix was available and I would have made a move on him as well. There are other moves that could have been made… but I’ll stop there. You can reason that those players were sitting at home this last weekend while the Chiefs were playing a meaningful game but you can also reason that the Chiefs will be sitting at home two weeks from now when they could be playing a meaningful game… had they signed those players.

Woulda-coulda-shoulda. Time to move on from that… or at least learn a lesson or two. Maybe more than two.

One of the pre-game reads that I had for the Chiefs to succeed was that they needed to put pressure on Tom Brady from up the middle, and that didn’t happen. Conversely, the Pats had Patrick Mahomes moving all day long and they didn’t care if he was better when throwing from outside the pocket, they just wanted him to feel pressure, and he did. A lot. That, was perhaps the difference in the game. So, you see, this game wasn’t just lost because of bad refereeing, the Chiefs players did plenty to contribute to this loss.

One of those horribly negative contributions came from Dee Ford late in the game. With one minute left Ford lined up in the neutral zone and then CB Charvarius Ward intercepted the ball for what would have been: GAME OVER. But no. Ford was called for a penalty and Wards INT was canceled out giving the ball back to the Pats and Brady to drive for a TD. Now, it’s not like Dee Ford had not been called for that exact same penalty in a previous game. He had. So, it’s up to the Chiefs coaches to make sure he never ever never does that again. One of our resident bloggers said it best:

“Close game. Ford doesn’t line up offsides, the Chiefs win -Merlin”

Although, it’s a team game and there certainly were many other opportunities for them to win situations and come out with a victory. The Ford situation is just one example of not winning on a specific play. Major Fail? No. Just a failure that added up with many other failures that eventually produced this loss.

It was a team loss, but the leadership of the Chiefs need to take a long hard look at themselves and ask if they had a hand in it? Then ask, just how big was their hand? There should be a lot of raised hands in the coaching room beginning with HC Andy Reid. Yes, Reid may have been a big reason that the team got to where they were at — the AFC Championship Game — but his own game day choices contributed heavily to this loss. It’s time for him to say more than, “I’ll take responsibility for this loss”… as if to abdicate for his players… because so many poor choices resulted in this defeat and fans of the Kansas City Chiefs deserve to know that Reid knows exactly everything he did… because there were lots of “things” in this everything.

This will be a hard one to get over. I do love watching the Chiefs in their red jerseys take the field and play against anyone. I’ve been doing that since the 1960s and will continue to do so. Like most fans, we’d like to know that the team is headed in the right direction. Today, I had my questions about that.

Laddie Morse — ArrowheadOne

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