Chiefs’ win against Jets was ugly, but it’s also a reminder of how they reached the top
In the aftermath of the Chiefs’ unsightly and confounding 23-20 victory over the New York Jets on Sunday night at MetLife Stadium, perhaps you might have expected a subdued locker room.
But even amid the hovering sense of relief and reflection, this was no scene of regret
“We do things in Kansas City fashion, man,” safety Justin Reid said, laughing. “We make everything can’t-miss TV.”
While Reid was being playful, he had a broader point that we’ll surely be debating and interpreting all season as we trace the story these weekly episodes will eventually create and reveal. As much as the Chiefs have done to put last season’s Super Bowl triumph in the past, lest it weaken their will or focus now, Reid noted, that path came with an abiding lesson.
A team that gritted out all three postseason wins by seven points or fewer, punctuated by a 38-35 victory over the Eagles in Super Bowl LVII, developed that mojo by winning seven regular-season games by six points or fewer.
That “toughness and tenacity,” as Reid put it, became defining traits and points of emotional reference by the postseason. For that matter, the Super Bowl LIV team that rallied from double-digit deficits in all three postseason games won five regular-season games by seven points or fewer along the way.
None of which assures anything this season, of course, especially since so many bigger challenges await.
You could say this night further suggests the Chiefs are vulnerable. Or you could say they have the stuff of something special since, hey, they had it in them to find a way … and that’s been a patented part of what it’s taken to play in three of the last four Super Bowls.
We don’t know yet. But we do know this was your public-service announcement that the NFL is brimming with parity and trap doors and unaccountable twists and turns.
Like the ones that abruptly engulfed this game after the Chiefs seized a 17-0 lead in the first quarter.
Suddenly, an end-zone facemask penalty on Jawaan Taylor — yet another debatable call on him, at least in terms of where it took place — gave the Jets a safety and a springboard.
Especially as, all the more improbably, Patrick Mahomes threw two second-quarter interceptions that were about as ill-considered as any the man with such uncanny awareness has tossed in the NFL.
Alas, it turns out not every Chiefs’ game is a 41-10 blowout like they dealt the Bears last week.
To the contrary.
“Last week was an every-now-and-then type of thing,” linebacker Willie Gay said, pondering the dynamic and later matter-of-factly adding, “We kind of don’t want it to be easy, because when adversity hits you don’t know what to do.”
Not that the Chiefs actually wanted it to unfold this way any more than any fan did.
“Even though I hate it while it’s happening,” Mahomes said, “I feel like it makes you better in the end if you win games like this when not everything is going perfect.”
In a certain way, Mahomes was the embodiment of that on Sunday. He sputtered with those interceptions and wasn’t sharp beyond short passes most of the night. And his signature play on a night he broke Alex Smith’s Chiefs’ career quarterback rushing record (he now has 1,701) wasn’t a pass, but a preposterous 25-yard run he unleashed on third and 23 as the Chiefs were running out the last 7 minutes, 24 seconds of the game.
In keeping with the theme, Mahomes smiled and said, “I don’t run pretty, so people think I’m slow. But I move a little better than people think.”
That was an improbable amount of time to drain to put it away, especially since it was launched from the Jets’ 47-yard-line after Tershawn Wharton recovered Zach Wilson’s fumble.
Like the rest of the night, it was sustained despite blunders such as two holding penalties and an apparent third interception that was negated by a Jets penalty.
A win is a win is a win, you could say, but this has distressing implications if it isn’t harnessed into an understanding that they got away with one here.
The takeaway has to be one of humility, not arrogance, and there’s plainly lots to be improved.
For the third time in four games, the Chiefs sabotaged themselves offensively — in this case with turnovers and, once more, penalties. Receivers aren’t getting much, if any, separation, and Mahomes seemed pressured more on Sunday than in the first three games combined.
I’ve held the premise that there is a profound hunger to this team, methodically activated by coach Andy Reid, passionately instilled by Mahomes and intuitive: The stakes are enormous, after all, in trying to become the first NFL team to repeat as champions in nearly 20 years and establish a bona fide, indisputable dynasty.
But this game stands as a Rorschach test of that notion: Will they be better off for it, as I believe, or does it expose them as less than what we might have supposed?
“I think to be a world champion, you have to be able to win in a lot of different styles,” linebacker Drue Tranquill said. “And every game is going to be different.”
And telling in their own way. Most likely, as Justin Reid said, smiling, they’ll “have you on the edge of your seat” most every game and all along the way to telling us what their real identity is.
This story was originally published October 2, 2023 at 5:30 AM.