The Chiefs and Confidence Levels

If you’re a long time Kansas City Chiefs fan, you know there are times when you feel a certain amount of certainty in parts of the team, and then there are times you don’t feel that. At all. This year, perhaps more than ever, it has been an on again off again affair with every Chiefs unit, including quarterback. That’s especially important to note with the Chiefs about to head into the playoffs. So, let’s take a look.

This has been Mahomes most inconsistent season to date. Here’s a look at his Passer Rating stats over his first four seasons as a starter:

Passer Rating

2018    113.8

2019      77.7

2020      78.1

2021      62.6

Also, here’s Mahomes Passer Ratings from week to week this year:

Some of his low games are littered throughout this season including scores of: 70.9, 62.3, 74.6, 74.8, 71.9, 57.3, which came against Denver (it’s a wonder we won that game), and ending the year with a 93.9. In 2020, the average passer rating in the NFL was 93.6 and so some fans might reason that Mahomes last game of this year was right at average, so why complain? Does anyone think Patrick Mahomes is an “average” passer? That’s why. Plus, Mahomes 13 INTs this year have him tied for 4th worst in the league. Not a good year, INT-wise.

You can see why I might be questioning the confidence level of the Chiefs QB position.

First of all, FB Michael Burton has been a downgrade from Anthony Sherman. He’s been okay, but not outstanding. With Clyde Edwards-Helaire injured for the third time in his first two seasons, he can’t be counted on to perform throughout the playoffs. HC Andy Reid says CEH is making progress, but even if he’s at full strength, he’s not the bell cow previous Chiefs RBs from the days of yore, have ever been. That’s compounded by the fact that he was a first round pick with much higher expectations than he’s produced thus far. Darrel Williams has provided a very good backup at RB, but even at his best, I’d still rate the Chiefs RB crew as the weakest of all AFC West RB crews.

When Tyreek Hill is at full strength, he’s one of the best WRs in the NFL and could be considered the league’s most dangerous becasue of his speed and quickness.

“Assuming” Hill will be fine, the issue has been the #2 WR ever since the Chiefs allowed Sammy Watkins to leave town. If Hill goes down, can we count on Byron Pringle, Mecole Hardman, Demarcus Robinson, Josh Gordon, or others?

The Chiefs DL has the potential to be one of the league’s best. However, in the season finale against the Broncos in Denver — even though Melvin Ingram forced a fumble that turned into a game winning scoop and score by Nick Bolton — the DL couldn’t get any pressure on the Broncos QB Drew Lock (interior DL Derrick Nnadi had one sack). The Broncos doubled Chris Jones which should have opened things up for everyone else, but… it didn’t. That was often the case early in the season because CJ was at DE… when no one was able to get pressure on the opposing QBs. That leads us to the big question: which DL will we get vs the Steelers and Ben Roethlisberger?

Nick Bolton and Willie Gay Jr. are the future of the LB position for K.C.. No doubt. However, Anthony Hitchens has another year on his contract and all other LBs look to him to be DC Steve Spagnuolo’s coach on the field. When fourth string Ben Niemann’s snaps are limited, the LB position can perform at a high level. However, because of injuries/Covid-19, they haven’t had a lot of games at full strength.

The Chiefs have some outstanding corners. During the Chiefs 8-game winning streak, they may have been the best unit in the league. Part of the problem/challenge with the K.C. CBs is how they are being used. DC Steve Spagnuolo likes his DBs to man-up at times and those also happen to be the exact times he needs to have gone to a zone, or given his CBs help over the top with a Safety (see game #16 and Ja’Marr Chase’ 266 receiving yards).

While Tyrann Mathieu remains one of the league’s best Safeties, the way he’s used has everything to do with how successful he is on any given play. Juan Thornhill has the speed to offer a second layer of protection the CBs need at times, but he’s often assigned elsewhere and is out of place. That get’s back to coaching.

Andy Reid has often had his head in the clouds this year, or it seems so. I’ve offered reasons that this might be the case this season, but nothing we can nail it down for sure. However, for one reason or the other, his head doesn’t seem to be 100% in the games at times –> which can be witnessed by his lack of in-game adjustments. David Bell offered this just yesterday:

“The biggest construct of failure was that the defense didn’t take away Ja’Marr Chase, the single most effective weapon in the Bengal inventory. In my view, Spags was determined to stick with what “he knew should work” as opposed to making the adjustment to counter the threat. Andy Reid, as the HC didn’t take action to address the problem with the DC either. That’s two failures I attribute to the coaching staff.”

With the Chiefs heading into the playoffs, my confidence level in each Chiefs unit is not high right now. Do I think they’ll beat the Pittsburgh Steelers this Sunday evening? Yes. However, beyond that, I’m not so sure.

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Laddie Morse — ArrowheadOne

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