The Kansas City Chiefs can run the ball, suddenly. Is this new development sustainable?
No sport promotes overreaction quite like football, which is a good thing to keep in mind at a moment when the Chiefs solved their run game problems and then added a two-time All-Pro running back.
The Chiefs’ run game has been sort of like Shaquille O’Neal’s free throw shooting. It’s the one thing keeping the broader operation closer to normal human behavior. It’s the one thing demanding some humility.
Please remember. The Chiefs were scoring nearly 30 points per game with a run game that almost-sort-of worked ... a little bit ... sometimes.
Now, they appear to be something like Nebraska in the 1990s — 245 yards on 46 attempts in Monday’s win at Buffalo.
Clyde Edwards-Helaire was the star, with 161 yards on 26 carries. But the line did well enough for 84 yards on 13 attempts for everyone else, too — virtually identical average, no matter who did the running. If this is less a one-off and more a new trend then goodnight.
“Our guys played as good of a game as they could possibly play for that weekend,” Chiefs offensive coordinator Eric Bieniemy said. “I thought the preparation was much better, the focus was better. I thought guys had a plan and they went out and executed their plan.”
The key, then: Is it repeatable?
The answer will be revealed in time and will be an enormous part of determining whether the Chiefs’ Super Bowl win is repeatable.
We can find clues in certain statistics, particular clips of the Bills game and what we know about the Bills’ strategies and abilities. We can use them together and make our best educated guess.
Let’s start with statistics. Beyond the traditional numbers, it’s interesting that Pro Football Focus charted Edwards-Helaire with 94 yards after contact and seven tackles avoided. Nobody else was close, which would indicate that Edwards-Helaire did a lot of this on his own.
Then again, PFF gave the Chiefs its highest grade in run-blocking since the Super Bowl, and its highest in a regular season game since 2015. That would indicate Edwards-Helaire had a lot of help.
It’s particularly interesting that the Chiefs averaged 4.8 yards per carry when rushing between the tackles, which has been a problem at times.
The Chiefs are built more for speed than power. That’s a sound strategy in today’s NFL, but defenses can better defend speed without the threat of power.
We know the success coincided with a shakeup on the offensive line. Daniel Kilgore has replaced Austin Reiter at center and the Chiefs played the bulk of the Bills game with Mike Remmers replacing the injured Mitchell Schwartz at right tackle, and Nick Allegretti replacing Remmers at left guard.
That’s a lot of moving parts, and not much sample size, but Kilgore appears to be an upgrade over Reiter (in the run game, at least) and Allegretti had a strong first start. Schwartz is the team’s best lineman, even if he’s better in pass protection than in the run. That gives Andy Reid an interesting decision when he returns — stick with Allegretti and more strength at left guard, or move Remmers back and count on his experience?
This is a good spot for those clips. There are a lot to choose from, and different points to emphasize. But we’re going to keep it to three here that we believe are representative.
The first is Edwards-Helaire’s 31-yard run in the first quarter — the Chiefs’ longest run of the season.
This play is a masterpiece. You know how Andy Reid likes to say “we all have a piece of that” when things go wrong? Well, they all have a piece of this one, too.
Tyreek Hill is lined up in the slot, and watch what the defense does when he and Nick Keizer break behind the line of scrimmage at the snap. The cornerback and both linebackers follow. Reid’s play design is effectively using two players’ motions to take three defenders out of the play.
Then, the right side of the line closes the edge and Kelce pushes his man out of the way. The hole is enormous. Edwards-Helaire has about eight easy yards if he simply runs into the defensive back. Instead, he pants’d the back and went for 31.
This next clip is less about Reid’s shiny objects, and more about thoroughness from line coach Andy Heck and preparation and execution by the players.
Kelce and Edwards-Helaire are lined up on either side of Mahomes, in the shotgun. At the snap, everyone on the line wins one-on-one, which frees Kilgore to get to the second level and wipeout the backside linebacker. Kelce levels the other linebacker and Mecole Hardman holds his block on a corner, which means Edwards-Helaire is 8 yards or so downfield before he takes on a defender.
The execution here is marvelous.
This last clip is another combination of Reid’s design and individuals beating the man in front of them. This is fourth and 1, and the Chiefs motion into an inverted wishbone with Hill behind Mahomes. You can bet defensive coordinators know Reid will come back to this.
On this snap, Hill and Kelce both go right. That drags both safeties out of the play when Darrel Williams gets the handoff going left.
Each lineman wins his matchup, and the linebacker who should be in the hole is fooled by Kelce’s movement and chases the wrong direction. That gives Williams a lane past the sticks and into the end zone.
This is scheme and execution.
So now we see that Reid’s play design is giving his offense advantages, that the linemen are winning their matchups, and that Edwards-Helaire is getting extra yards when he can.
That would all be enough for a successful run game anyway, but it was amplified by the Bills being stubborn with playing deep coverages that invited the run.
Bills coach Sean McDermott made clear after the game and again this week that the Bills wanted to limit Mahomes’ throws downfield. They did that, for the most part, but at the expense of allowing consistent production on the ground.
ESPN’s Dan Orlovsky charted 36 of the Chiefs’ 73 snaps as facing two high safeties. According to his numbers the Chiefs ran 28 run-pass-options or run plays in those snaps, which turned into 17 rushes for 150 yards.
That tells us a lot. First, it tells us that a head coach and quarterback who would prefer to throw 12 times out of 10 maintained discipline to stick with the run. Also, critically, the Chiefs’ standard is not to run like the Ravens. They do not need to run effectively against stacked boxes, and they don’t need 245 yards rushing ever again. All they need to do is be effective enough against those two high safety looks that defenses are forced closer to the line of scrimmage.
The Bills have issues defensively, both across the line and in the secondary. The Broncos will present a better challenge this weekend, and after that the Chiefs have more games against better run defenses like the Bucs, Saints and even the Falcons. The Steelers loom as a potential playoff opponent with the league’s best run defense, according to Football Outsiders.
So the results are unlikely to be this good consistently. But again, they don’t have to be. They just need to be good enough to beat two high safeties.
From what we saw with new personnel on the interior of the line and what we can reasonably expect from Le’Veon Bell, the Chiefs have to be encouraged that their offense can do it.
This story was originally published October 23, 2020 at 11:00 AM.