Mellinger Minutes: Chiefs’ C+, Butker’s breakout, Chiefs as new Patriots + much more
One funny thing about the Chiefs is that they have not played their best and are 2-0, with wins over two teams that expect to be in the postseason.
Another funny thing about the Chiefs is that they just played on the road without as many as five starters on defense and held their opponent to 20 points on 10 possessions.
One more funny thing is that Patrick Mahomes has gone Captain Checkdown for two weeks, was as ineffective over 3 1/2 quarters against the Chargers as we’ve seen him and was escaping pressure for most of the afternoon ... and the Chiefs still rank second in scoring percentage (66.7) and points per possession (3.78).
In other words: the Chiefs’ C+ game is good enough to win a lot of NFL games and, I’m sorry, I’ve followed this team long enough that it still feels like those words should be deleted and their author given a breathalyzer.
The Chiefs are a Super Bowl champion with demonstrated room to improve. Reid’s early years in Kansas City were marked in part by inconsistent results:
In 2013, they started 9-0, then had separate three-game losing streaks over the last eight.
In 2015, they started 1-5, then won 11 straight (including the franchise’s first playoff win a gajillion years).
In 2017, they had that miserable 1-6 stretch in the middle, so bad that Reid gave Matt Nagy the playcalls.
But the last two seasons have been marked, in part, by improvement. That’s particularly true of last year, when the defense steadied over the second half and the post-injury Mahomes was a problem for everyone.
If that’s the pattern we’ll see this year, then the Chiefs have to be considered at or above expectations. They have shown different ways to score, and this is a case of arbitrary endpoints, but they’re one of only four teams to allow 20 or fewer points in each of their first two games.
You can see how this thing could improve, again. The coaches and players will continue to find ways to put various pressure points into more snaps on offense — running against sub-packages, throwing against base and creating triangles of options for Mahomes that include make-you-miss playmakers for every throw.
The defense needs to be complete. Injuries and absences aren’t excuses, because Next Man Up and all that, but on Sunday the Chiefs played without their top two corners, an effective pass rusher, their best run defender and another starting defensive lineman.
The Chiefs have an interesting tightrope to walk. They know they will be in the playoffs, but the trick is to ensure you’re playing your best in January and not October, all the while minding the fact that the No. 1 seed is a bigger advantage than ever because it holds the only first-round bye.
All other things equal, the Chiefs would rather be playing their best as the No. 2 seed than stretched thin as the No. 1, but this is something to keep an eye on — particularly with post-Thanksgiving games against the Bucs, Saints and Chargers.
This is all a bit of a setup for this point: The Ravens game is not only a potential AFC Championship Game preview* but also the first game that’s a virtual lock to be remembered when the playoff positioning takes shape.
* PLEASE let there be an AFC Championship Game.
I am unreasonably excited about this Baltimore game.
It’s the AFC’s best two teams, with styles that should create even more excitement. If Mahomes-Jackson is this generation’s Brady-Manning then the AFC will have had a hell of an extended run.
This week’s eating recommendation is the catfish at Lutfi’s, and the reading recommendation is Tim Kurkjian on Joe West.
Thanks to everyone who’s listened to our Mellinger Minutes For Your Ears podcast, and here is a big warm invitation to start if you haven’t already. We had some delivery issues in the beginning, but those are fixed now that we’re out from behind the paywall and free on Apple or Spotify or Stitcher or whoever you animals get your shows these days.
Reminder: If you’d like to participate in the show — and I’d love for you to do that — please call 816-234-4365 and leave your first name, where you’re calling from, and almost literally question.
Please give me a follow on Twitter and Facebook and, as always, thanks for your help and thanks for reading.
I’ll go the other way: Butker owes Allegretti a ribeye and bottle of bourbon, because Allegretti just made Butker a star.
Kickers make 53-yarders to win games all the time.
How many make a 53-yarder, and then two 58-yarders to win in overtime?
Allegretti was doing Butker a solid, that’s what that was.
Steven St. John made this point on the Border Patrol: Butker just had the best game by any kicker in Chiefs history.
If it’s an exaggeration, it’s not by much, and we can go through the Chiefs’ tortured history with kickers if we want, but this is also a franchise that’s had Jan Stenerud, Nick Lowery and Morten Andersen.
Butker’s is a fairly remarkable story, and we’ll get into that more this week, but for now here’s a point:
A man signed off the Panthers’ practice squad three weeks into the 2017 season has not missed from inside 50 yards since 2018 (he then hit the go-ahead kick in overtime of that game).
Butker is No. 4 in field goal accuracy among all kickers since entering the league, and 89 of 93 (95.7 percent) inside 50 yards.
If what we saw from SoFi Stadium is an indication of where Butker is on long kicks — he didn’t even bother to watch the last one go through, instead putting his arms up and walking toward the bench like he’s Larry Bird in the 1988 three-point contest — the Chiefs have one more player who’s as good at his job as anyone in the league.
For what it’s worth, the current list would be Patrick Mahomes, Tyreek Hill, Travis Kelce and Tyrann Mathieu. You can argue for Mitch Schwartz — and trust me, I have — and Chris Jones, but either way, that’s a pretty special thing.
Russell Wilson and Aaron Rodgers are the only guys I can imagine making the pass to Hill on the touchdown. It’s not just the agility, and not just the arm strength. It’s the accuracy.
Watch this thing again, and tell me that if you could you’d place the ball even 6 inches or a half-step differently that Mahomes does here from 50-some yards out:
That doesn’t look flat to me.
Then, like you say, the 2-point conversion was a dang magic trick:
Look, the Chiefs did not play their best on Sunday. Most of us would agree on that. The defense missed too many tackles and assignments and needed to get off the field quicker in the fourth quarter. The offense allowed too much pressure without hurting the Chargers on the back end, never got the run game going and missed on too many points of execution.
And they still won.
I have some level of concern. The Chiefs are a brutal out for any team in the league, but they’ll get beat with that effort from Sunday.
They need to be better, and they know that. I’ll even go one step more and say I can see why some would think Mahomes is flat. Especially if they’re trying to tick off a friend.
He hasn’t been throwing deep. He missed some throws against the Chargers. Made a couple weird decisions. He’s drifting in the pocket again, a bad habit from the Texas Tech days that appears every once in a while.
But just watching the games* I can’t see where he’s flat.
* OK, fine, watching the games several times each.
I thought he showed maturity and discipline in the Texans game, and resiliency and that “athletic arrogance” that Vic Fangio talks about against the Chargers.
Mahomes needs to be better. We know that. He knows that. He’s too important. But we have two-plus seasons of a track record that says he will be better.
I’ll trust that until the evidence points us the other way.
OK, now, please allow me to make Mellinger Minutes history here, the first time in a decade of Kansas City’s favorite weekly timesuck that we have a quadruple question.
#1:
#2:
#3:
#4:
I feel you guys. This is weird.
I think about this all the time, and Miriam, you’re in a similar situation: My 6-year-old first really got into football last season, and it’s hard to see how this won’t be a lifelong thing for him, which means he’ll be, what, in college before he knows what it’s like to watch the Chiefs without Mahomes?
If you’ve followed the Chiefs for any length of time, it does feel surreal sometimes. The Chiefs put in decades of being the extra in some other team’s highlight — John Elway is the all-time leader, but we’ve also seen turns with Peyton Manning, Tom Brady, Jim Kelly, Andrew Luck, even Marcus Mariota. Heck, the Chiefs once lost a game to the Broncos when Tim Tebow completed 2 of 8 passes.
It’s sort of like the sports fan’s version of rags to riches. A franchise that went to comical lengths in teaching its fans to expect the worst now employs a quarterback for whom normal laws of game situation and gravity don’t always apply.
This hit like a meteor early, all the way back to the 2018 Monday night game in Denver, when Mahomes converted 93 third-and-longs and made the left-handed pass to Tyreek Hill.
I believe it’s the only time in what is now 11 seasons covering this team that I spent postgame in the other team’s locker room, just because I wanted to see what that was like. It did not disappoint.
Mahomes is the centerpiece, obviously, but it’s always worth remembering that he’s provided an enviable platform: steady and creative coaching, perhaps the league’s fastest receiver and perhaps the league’s most dynamic tight end.
Mahomes is now 6-0 in games he trails by 10 or more points which, let’s just be honest, is objectively hilarious.
There’s a sliding scale of how many yards you need, what the score is, how much time is left, and where you are on the field, but I say this without exaggeration:
Opponents should go for more fourth downs against the Chiefs than they do anyone else.
It’s appropriate we’re talking about this ahead of the Chiefs-Ravens game, because I always go back to what Ravens coach John Harbaugh said after his team lost at Arrowhead. The Ravens went for it on four fourth downs, plus three two-point conversions, that day. It was, objectively speaking, awesome.
I know I’m a bit of a go-for-it zealot, but I loved what Harbaugh said after the game:
“I have a good understanding of the numbers and how it works,” he said. “I have people in my ear that help with that as well, which is important. Not just with that, but with challenges and things like that. We’re very organized in what we do and we have a method and a process. It’s very detailed and well thought out.
“We’re standing by our decisions. Our decisions gave us the best chance to win the game, in that particular game. These are not like league average choices. These are determined by this game and for this game specifically, in that venue ...
“It wasn’t a field position game. It was a possession game. Making the most of each possession was what counted.”
I adore this. All of it. The humility to listen to analytics. The comfort to apply vastly different strategies based on the situation. The confidence to stick with the reasoning.
I’m not saying you never punt against the Chiefs. But I am saying that Chiefs fans are pretty pumped whenever the opponent punts, because it means Mahomes gets to play quarterback again, and it often doesn’t matter whether he plays quarterback from the 50-yard line or his own 3 — the Chiefs are usually scoring.
The Ravens are better equipped to do this than most. They have an alien quarterback of their own, a man who is completing 67.3 percent of his passes the last two seasons while blessed with the legs of a ninja. They also have three running backs capable of reading the blocks and picking up short yardage.
Anthony Lynn is a good coach, and the Chargers appear to be building something real in their post-Rivers existence.
But I believe they’d have been a more formidable opponent if they used Harbaugh’s aggressiveness on fourth down.
A list?
A list!
5. Christian Colon. I’m not even joking. He’s 2-for-2 all-time in the postseason, and those two are among the biggest hits in more than a half century of the Royals.
4. Tom Watson. The 1977 Masters and 1982 U.S. Open were a long time ago, but the memories go forever.
3. Wade Davis. If I’m overrating him here, it’s only because he was ruthlessly effective in all situations. But across the Royals’ postseason runs, he gave up one run in 25 innings, with 28 strikeouts, five walks, and 14 hits. Pitching on both sides of the rain delay in Game 6 against the Blue Jays was only borderline human.
2. Patrick Mahomes. Yes, I do believe he’s this high already. And, yes, this might be too low.
1. George Brett. The homer off Goose Gossage was a seismic shift in the Royals’ most heated rivalry of all time, and The George Brett Game is what we call the time he went 4-for-4 with four runs scored, two home runs, three RBIs and the greatest defensive play of his career in Game 3 of the 1985 ALCS. Brett slashed .337/.397/.627 in the playoffs.
Well, I’m not going to argue that I’m not nuts, but I do believe it was the right call to kick.
Let’s be clear: The Chiefs had two good options here.
This is a small thing, but it was fourth and a full 1, not inches, with their best short-yardage back injured.
The risk of missing the kick is substantial, because then the Chargers get the ball at the 43. But the benefit of converting the fourth down is somewhat diminished because you’re inside the two-minute warning and will probably end up with a field goal attempt later anyway.
Is the difference between, say, a 45-yarder and 53-yarder* worth the risk of being stopped on fourth down and giving up your chance to end it?
* I understand the Chiefs could’ve pushed further ahead, but teams always go conservative there. You’re not calling Wasp in that situation.
I think you know me well enough to know I’m always for a good fourth-down attempt, and if Reid did it there I wouldn’t criticize either way.
But if you have a chance to end it, with a terrific kicker like that who’s already split it from 58, I think you let him shine.
I’m probably taking your question too literally, but those missed tackles aren’t getting as much conversation because the Chiefs won.
The defense gave up just 20 points, and if Mahomes, Hill and Kelce are playing on a team that gives up just 20 points, that has to be a win 101 times out of 100.
The standards for defenses in the NFL aren’t what some of us grew up on, and they’re not even the same as they are for teams that have normal human quarterbacks.
Let us be clear: The defense missed too many tackles.
Pro Football Focus had the Chiefs down for 14 missed tackles against the Chargers, though I have to say it felt like more. Juan Thornhill had a particularly rough one early, when he had a chance at the running back near the line of scrimmage but it ended up being a long gain and first down.
Let’s keep this honest, though. The defense is down five starters right now, including their top two cornerbacks and their best run defender.
Mike Pennel will almost certainly be back in time for the Ravens game Monday night. We’ll see what Charvarius Ward does in practice this week. Bashaud Breeland is halfway through his four-game suspension. Khalen Saunders and Alex Okafor are working their way back, too.
Impromptu rookie quarterback or not, you’ll sign up for 20 points surrendered every day in that situation.
The Chiefs’ most recent five drafts are a pretty good blueprint for how to build a perennial contender:
In 2016, they traded out of their first round pick (No. 28 overall) and selected Chris Jones at No. 37. They took Demarcus Robinson and Parker Ehinger (who they later traded for Charvarius Ward) in the fourth round and Tyreek Hill in the fifth.
In 2017, they traded up for Patrick Mahomes and still got Tanoh Kpassagnon in the second and Kareem Hunt in the third.
In 2018, well, that draft class looks less than awesome. Derrick Nnadi came in the third round, and he has the look of a fine interior defensive lineman. Dorian O’Daniel might have some moments. Other than that, they haven’t had much from this class.
In 2019, the Chiefs appear to have cleaned up, and without a first-round pick (the Frank Clark trade): Mecole Hardman and Juan Thornhill in the second round, Khalen Saunders in the third, Rashad Fenton and Darwin Thompson in the sixth, and Nick Allegretti in the seventh.
Then this year, of course, the class was headlined by Clyde Edwards-Helaire in the first and Willie Gay Jr. in the second. Third-round pick Lucas Niang opted out, L’Jarius Sneed looks like a steal so far, and Michael Danna and Thakarius Keyes have a chance to contribute.
The play on Sunday, look, Sneed a great play on the ball against a top-shelf, strong, competitive receiver. He deserves credit. But I just can’t get past how terrible this decision was from Justin Herbert.
He had the easiest first down of the day. Instead, he decided to throw against his body, back toward the middle of the field, a throw he knew would float. My goodness.
Herbert looks legitimate. If he’s as adaptable and smart as they say, this will not be a common occurrence. OK, I’ll move on now.
I bring this up in part because it’s not the interceptions that are so impressive about Sneed right now. It’s his coverage, and his versatility.
Look at him here, bottom of the screen, isolated against the speedy and experienced Brandin Cooks. On paper, this is a terrible matchup for the Chiefs. Sneed doesn’t figure to have a significant speed advantage, Cooks is crafty with his releases, and Deshaun Watson can see pre snap that Sneed has no help over the top.
Watson knows exactly where this ball is going when it’s snapped. Again, bottom of the screen here, watch Sneed disrupt timing at the line, turn and run downfield, then turn back to knock the ball away. The exaggerated incomplete sign at the end is a nice touch, too.
The Chiefs have some stuff to work with here, is the point.
Sneed fits a lot of what Spagnuolo likes: he’s fast, he’s versatile, he’s egoless and an earnest learner.
That’ll play.
Yeah man, this is a real thing. Pennel makes a big difference for the Chiefs against the run.
I’m not sure how to quantify this, exactly — how much is Pennel’s individual talents, how much is the way others around him play when he’s on the field, how much is just weird variance in a game with a funny shaped ball.
But it’s real.
Pennel’s return is exactly in time, too, because nobody in the NFL has a run game quite like the Ravens — they essentially have four RB1 quality runners, including Lamar Jackson.
The can run inside and out, with no discernible tells about direction or play call before the snap.
The Ravens had the best run game in the league last year, and are at 5.1 yards per rush through two weeks.
Time will tell, but it appears that Lamar Jackson is an even better passer than he was last year, when he won MVP and led the league in touchdown passes. He’s completed 77.6 percent so far, with 9.8 yards per attempt.
Like, tell me exactly how this pass could be improved upon:
I know I’m tangent-ing here. You didn’t ask about Lamar Jackson.
But I’ve very excited for this game, you guys.
Does Clyde Edwards-Helaire count?
Can he still be a next, even though he’s playing?
Asa Lacy and Bobby Witt Jr. are the obvious answers here, I suppose, because it’s hard to find a scout who doesn’t believe either of those guys aren’t going to be stars.
I know baseball people who are not prone to hyperbole who believe Lacy and Witt Jr. should be on the opening day roster in 2021, which would be a hell of a thing to essentially skip the minor leagues.
We’re going to talk more about Witt Jr. here a couple questions from now, so let’s focus on Lacy. I have a friend who coached against Lacy in college and said he’s the best pitcher he’s seen at that level.
It’s hard to replicate competitive games in what is essentially regular scrimmages, but Lacy is said to be as committed mentally as he is gifted physically, so you’d think he’d be better equipped than most.
Pitchers can develop quicker than hitters, and Lacy would not be MLB’s youngest player right now. Barring injury, I’d be surprised if he’s not in the big leagues sometime next season.
And if he’s not very good soon after then, well, a lot of people in baseball will be surprised.
Well, I’m not sure I agree with the premise that nobody is talking about the Chargers. There’s a lot to like about what they’re doing. My hesitation in thinking of them as clearly above either the Raiders or Broncos is that we didn’t know anything about Herbert.
We know more now than we did when we ate breakfast Sunday.
We know enough, in fact, that I would move the Chargers ahead of the Broncos in the theoretical Next Division Rival for the Chiefs. The Raiders have to be considered behind the others until Jon Gruden finally stops pretending he likes Derek Carr.
The Chargers’ primary problem is injuries. They just can’t get out of the way. Derwin James is a tremendous player, one of the best in the league, and it’s hard to watch the Chargers without wondering what kind of difference he’d make.
Because they have so many pieces in place. Difference makers at every level of the defense, especially up front. Strong skill guys, a young quarterback who sure looks the part. They need to block for Herbert. That’s a real thing.
But Anthony Lynn is a good coach, and this is an enticing mix of youth and experience. Thumbs up on what they’re doing there.
The Broncos are in a similar spot, actually. They’ve surrounded Drew Lock with a lot of talent — the Courtland Sutton injury stinks — and the defense has a lot to like, as well. I’m less in on Fangio than I am Lynn, but you can see how the thing might work.
None of this is important, I get that, so maybe I’m screaming into the void here, but there’s no real purpose in declaring the rest of the AFC West like a horse race. The other three are in relatively similar spots here, and they’ll begin to separate soon enough.
Right now, I’d give the Chargers a slight edge over the Broncos, with a slightly bigger gap from there to the Raiders, but really, a prop bet of which of the three will win a division title first would be a virtual tossup.
I do miss watching Derwin James play football, and I miss it enough that I’m going to drop this play here. In the two-plus years of Mahomes as QB1, I don’t think I’ve heard him talk with more admiration about a specific play from an opponent as this one:
OK, moving on ...
It would impact his service time, but the Royals have never let that enter their thinking. We have many examples of this, from Alex Gordon to Eric Hosmer to Brady Singer.
The Royals could have had an extra YEAR of control of Singer on the back end if they waited SIX DAYS for his first start this season.
I strongly disagree with the Royals on this particular issue, even while I strongly admire them for their stance.
Witt Jr. is a special prospect. He is athletic, a diligent worker, gifted physically, with an improving swing that is eliminating some swing-and-miss while not sacrificing power. He’s good enough to stay at shortstop, and athletic enough to play somewhere else.
But — and this isn’t a great answer — there’s no rush.
Witt Jr. turned 20 in June, and right now his official professional experience is limited to 37 games in the 2019 Arizona fall league.
My expectation is that Witt Jr. will have a strong spring training and have a chance to start the season at Class AA. If it goes that way, anyone at Class AA is getting looks from the big league team.
This question comes up a lot, and we’ve answered it here, so for now let’s do the short answer of the GMDM job security question:
I have no indication that he won’t be able to see the current push through. But the fact that John Sherman owns the team now, and not David Glass, matters. Glass and Moore had a deep relationship that Sherman and Moore have not had time to develop.
Moore doesn’t get to be the GM of a losing team forever, but if the centerpieces of the current movement remain promising I’d be surprised if Moore isn’t given at least one more losing record in 2021.
A reasonable expectation: The Royals start relatively strong next season, then fade as a bunch of young players who had no minor-league games this year and only 60 big-league games navigate a 162-game season for the first time. Let’s say they finish 70-92, something like that.
Then in 2022 the training wheels are off, and if the big-league team stinks, or the farm system isn’t supplying a reasonable line of talent, or Moore talks Sherman into some major contract that backfires, well, this is a results business.
Now, the broader point, which is why I’m including this question: Yes, absolutely. The game needs people like Dayton Moore.
Moore is in a curious spot, the more you think about it. Winning a World Series in *Kansas City* with what he took over in 2006 is a greater professional achievement than 99 percent of baseball executives will have.
Moore could have retired on that and lived it forever, but he’s still only 53, which means he has a lot of years left to work. He’s working with most of the same people now as he did the first time around, and he’s never told me this, but I’ve always had the sense that Moore would love to give it up someday and let J.J. Picollo or Gene Watson or Rene Francisco take the top seat.
But, then, what comes after that for Moore?
He’s done every baseball operations job imaginable*. Would he be interested in a bigger market job, with a bigger payroll? Perhaps, but I’ve had a lot of conversations with Moore and don’t believe that’s what motivates him.
* Except analytics!
His greatest contribution to the game might be as a sort of grassroots czar. Give him a title like MLB executive vice president of baseball’s future.
Make sure it’s a leadership position, where his charge is to essentially create more Daytons, deployed around the country to continue and enhance existing strategies to ensure baseball’s next 20 years are more inclusive and growing than the last 20.
More than anyone I’ve ever talked to in a competitive baseball job, Moore believes in the importance of a healthy sport beyond TV revenue and ticket sales. He is an advocate for the kind of ballplayer who tops out in college, or the low level of the minors, but continues to love the game and teach it and spread it in his hometown.
Dayton is passionate about making baseball a big tent sport, to paraphrase a political cliche, providing opportunities for middle-class and below families. He talks a lot about wanting baseball to be as popular and available for poorer American families as football and basketball.
I hope his future involves something like that. He’s a good baseball man, and a tremendous leader, but there are a lot of good baseball men with leadership skills. He could retire tomorrow and the Royals would hire a GM with a strong record.
But I’m not sure how many people are better equipped to grow the sport’s broad strokes future.
I’d love to see him do something like that, whenever he’s done being a general manager.
Well, I did not.
Now, I don’t know how reliable Twitter’s analytics are, but as of Monday afternoon that dumb joke had over 300,000 “impressions” and 30,000 “engagements,” and you’re never going to bat 1.000 at that rate.
It is weird, though, seeing people not just take it seriously but in a one case and maybe two (?) people take it seriously AND AGREE.
Life is swell. Take the entertainment where you can.
This week, I’m particularly grateful for convenience. Stay with me here. My lawnmower broke this weekend. After I called around and Googled enough to know it didn’t make sense to fix, I got on my phone, found the same model on sale, clicked buy and picked it up without ever leaving my car. I was mowing again in 45 minutes. I would’ve preferred to not spend $350, but have it pretty easy in this world in a lot of ways.
This story was originally published September 22, 2020 at 5:00 AM.