The Chiefs’ most pressing issue needs a savior, and Patrick Mahomes hasn’t been it
It’s fourth-and-short, and Chiefs coach Andy Reid has decided to go for a first down rather than a short field goal, checking the obvious box by every analytical measure. So here comes, um, tight end Noah Gray under center for a sneak?
It fails, by the way.
It’s third-and-short one quarter later, with the Chiefs on the plus-side of the field, and so here comes, um, wide receiver Kadarius Toney for a direct snap?
It fails, by the way.
The Chiefs beat the Broncos 19-8 on the Thursday Night Football feature — and I know that feels like a sharp turn after the start of this column. But that’s kind of the point.
The Chiefs operate under a different set of expectations than ever before in their history, which means sometimes we have to critique the wins, not just the losses. And that’s not just me talking. Here’s Reid after the game: “We strive for something better than what we’re doing right now.”
If the Chiefs want to stack those wins in January and February, it might be beneficial to solve the worries of September and October.
So back to those two plays at the top — you know, the two that prompted you to use the word “cute” more often than you will while seeing your toddler run around the pumpkin patch on a rare Chiefs-free weekend.
You probably assume what I’m going to say next: Give the (dang) ball to Patrick Mahomes and be done with it.
Right?
Well, except that doesn’t solve everything in short yardage. Or at least it hasn’t.
The play calls, it turns out, are only the secondary problem, simply trying to mask the primary problem. Which is this: The Chiefs think they need to trick the defense to be top-of-the-league successful in short-yardage situations — and, gulp, they just might be right.
They have been combating this thing for awhile now, and nothing is working as well as it should be. Not running the ball, which the rest of the league uses as its crutch, per FTN Football Almanac, but in which the Chiefs have a below average success rate. And not even giving the (dang) ball to Mahomes.
Since the onset of 2022, the Chiefs have converted on third or fourth downs with 1 or 2 yards to go only 62.3% of the time. That ranks 22nd in the league.
In contrast, they convert on all other third and fourth downs (those with 3-plus yards to go) at a 3.6% better clip than any team in the league.
Their offense, and their quarterback in particular, is a third- and fourth-down cheat code ...
... that runs out of gas when given a head start.
It’s as baffling as it is frustrating.
The NFL, for what it’s worth, converts third-and-1 rushes into first downs 36% more often than pass attempts, per FTN.
We expect the Chiefs to turn to Mahomes because, well, when is he not the solution?
Here.
Yes, they are better when they just let Mahomes do his thing, but if you’ve been clamoring for that as the end-all, be-all solution, know that it’s only marginally better — 64.4% rather than 62.3%. Even this season, the Chiefs are 7 of 11 using Mahomes in short yardage, and they are 7 of 12 without him involved in the play. It’s basically the difference between not great and bad.
The complaints about the “cute” stuff are rampant, and I get it, but we all love the cute stuff when it works, and the cute stuff actually solved this issue before. Did you know the Chiefs were 4-for-4 on the Blake Bell quarterback sneak one year? Did you know they were 8-for-8 on the fullback trap to Michael Burton the next season, in 2021, when they led the NFL in converting short-yardage situations?
To be clear, of course it ought to always include at least the threat of Mahomes — it might work a little better if the defense thinks an elite quarterback has the potential to take the ball — but it’s shortsighted to wipe your hands and consider the full scope of the problem solved.
The conversation can start there, but it can’t end there.
What’s most to blame is that while nearly every other team in football is willing to run the ugly — the quarterback sneak — the Chiefs refuse after a freak Mahomes injury in 2019. And therefore they cannot be the same kind of cute as what’s already on tape for the world to see.
The quarterback throws are better left out of the equation for the rest of the NFL.
The quarterback sneak is off-limits in KC.
It demands that Reid finds another way. And he was a 0-for-2 Thursday.
And embarrassed by the manner in which that 0-for-2 arrived.
“We gotta take care of business with that,” he said, after saying the yardage was too lengthy to attempt the fake field goal. “Again, I’ll take that one. Obviously that wasn’t good enough.”
Reid also used the phrase “back to the drawing board,” which, while maybe just a habit in a news conference, glosses over that they wore that dry-erase marker thin in the offseason. The Chiefs were 62.3% on short yardage a year ago, said it needed to be addressed, spent large chunks of training camp working on it, and through six games they have moved all the way to 62.5%.
That’s a lot of time and energy from one of the world’s best play designers and one of the world’s best quarterbacks for a return of 0.2%.
The inconvenient truth is there is no apparent solution waiting to flip this switch.
The convenient truth is there wasn’t a year ago either, and we know how that season concluded.
Mahomes saved the latter. He can’t save the former.
This story was originally published October 13, 2023 at 5:30 AM.