How the Bills beat up Patrick Mahomes — and the part the Chiefs must change
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Mahomes led a late drive but Chiefs failed to convert in fourth quarter
- Bills used four-man rushes and coverage plans to contain Chiefs offense
- Game outcome hinged on Chiefs execution and protection, not roster depth
The Chiefs had a sliver of a chance after halftime here in Orchard Park, N.Y., possessing the football and the game within seven points. And the best come-from-behind quarterback in the NFL finished that drive on his, well, behind.
Couldn’t have been more fitting.
The Bills again swiped the regular-season meeting against the Chiefs, 28-21 — though not because they are the more complete team, but instead because four is apparently greater than five.
Buffalo presented the Chiefs with a blitz-adverse and coverage-heavy game plan, sending just four rushers at the quarterback, yet still delivered Patrick Mahomes one of the most painful losses of his career.
Not figuratively.
Literally.
Mahomes spent the game on his backside, hurried or outright hit by rushers 15 times in all. Fifteen! Joey Bosa got him five times. Greg Rousseau got him four more. There’s a commonality between those two Bills: They rush from the edge. The Chiefs’ tackles were thoroughly man-handled, and they tried three of them because right tackle Jawaan Taylor left with an ankle injury.
On the other end of it sat a stern reminder: For all the returns of Rashee Rice and Xavier Worthy have done to reshape the offense, it doesn’t mean a damn thing if the Chiefs can’t protect their most valuable asset.
That is the most telling direction of their future.
It’s been the most telling development of their past. The primary non-Mahomes reason they had scored at least 28 points in five straight weeks is the same group that failed them most in Buffalo: the offensive line.
Mahomes completed fewer than half of his attempts for the first time in an NFL or college game he started — and, I’m guessing, for the first time in his life. He didn’t play well and missed pulling the trigger on more than a couple of throws himself, but if nearly 200 games have produced a single statistical outcome and one offers a contrasting outcome, maybe we ought to look at the context behind it, yeah?
Mahomes faced pressure more than half the time he dropped into the pocket for a pass Sunday, and that’s true for the first time since Week 5 of the 2020 season, per Next Gen Stats. The Bills’ pass rush greeted him on 20 of 38 dropbacks in the pocket.
When under fire, Mahomes completed only three of 16 passes for 61 yards and an interception, per the NGS data. Which means when left in a clean pocket with which to operate, he completed 12 of 18 throws for 189 yards.
It all seems so simple.
It is. Mostly.
There’s actually a little more to it — some context within the context, if you will.
The Bills pressured Mahomes often but they didn’t often pressure him all that quickly. That probably comes across a bit confounding.
The Bills rarely blitzed, leaving seven defenders in coverage, the perfect of both worlds when you can generate pressure anyway. But it’s the type of coverage that seemed to give the Chiefs fits: man-to-man.
The Chiefs’ offensive hot streak has exploited zone coverage. Mahomes has put up by far the best numbers against zone this season — racking up 75.57 expected points added (EPA), per FTN data. Daniel Jones is a distant second at 51.94 EPA.
But the last four weeks? Whew. Mahomes had compiled 63.67, double any other quarterback.
The Bills, who, mind you, have not played particularly good defense this year, gave them something new and maybe some new wrinkles along with it. Why wouldn’t you?
“When they’re playing the man-type coverages, (and we’re) trying to get some guys open downfield, they did a good job of pushing the pocket,” Mahomes said. “I have to be better at working the pocket, finding different lanes to step through.
“When I was able to, we were able to hit shots downfield. But it’s just gotta be more consistent with that.”
Alas, it’s the offensive line ... and the receivers needing to separate ... and the quarterback being a little more willing to take some chances.
It all plays into a perfectly bad formula.
Look, this is one game, and while it’s enticing to make big-picture assumptions from it, it comes on the heels of the offensive line playing pretty darn good football. (And the quarterback playing pretty darn good too, which is not exactly a coincidence.)
Don’t get me wrong. I’m not remotely trying to say one game is irrelevant — even if the Chiefs have avenged this loss time and again in postseason rematches, their path to the No. 1 seed just became really, really tough.
Here’s where it actually matters beyond the seeding: That one game is now out there for the remainder of the league. This is what the Chiefs will have to beat if they want to beat anyone and everyone. They are plenty capable. They are still a good team, a really good team potentially, but with some imperfections that are more glaring than when they arrived in Western New York.
You can just bet that on the other side of Kansas City’s bye week, the Broncos will try to implement the same rush-with-four, win-with-man formula. It’s not as though it’s innovative, but they know it’s been the only thing effective against the Chiefs over the last month-plus. And they have to have the dudes to give it a whirl. They pressure the quarterback on 45.9% of pass rushes; no other team in the NFL is better than 40%.
The Chiefs will have a bye week to make some adjustments they didn’t make on the fly Sunday. That factored into the outcome. Some short, quick throws might’ve been effective.
There’s some good fortune in the timing of a week reprieve — they spend a bye week self-scouting more than anything. And after a date with the Bills, that self-scout won’t simply illuminate a quarterback playing like an MVP.
Instead, it will offer a reminder of exactly what makes him play like an MVP.
This story was originally published November 3, 2025 at 6:00 AM.