Why Chiefs’ win over Patriots was a step forward, even with Kadarius Toney’s blunder
Let’s start with a flashing yellow light: The New England Patriots have wilted into a husk of their glory days, deemed unfit for the originally scheduled prime-time Monday Night Football matchup with the Chiefs.
So Kansas City’s 27-17 victory over the Patriots (3-11) couldn’t provide real clarity about the ultimate trajectory of the 2023 Chiefs (9-5).
It’s also true that any traction the Chiefs might have gained Sunday at Gillette Stadium would be rendered irrelevant if they fall to the Raiders (6-8) on Christmas Day. Like one step up and two steps back … with minimal time left to get it right before the reckoning of the postseason.
But there’s another sort of light to cast on all this.
Even as it’s become reflexive to be exasperated by the flaws of a team that’s played in three of the last four Super Bowls, won two of them and is seeking to become the first NFL team to repeat as champions in nearly two decades.
And even as many spend the wake of the game consumed only with the few gaudy gaffes on Sunday — particularly the latest in the saga of the ever-precarious Kadarius Toney.
Challenging as it might be to compartmentalize that or unsee a dropped touchdown pass and two fumbles the Chiefs were fortunate to recover, it also makes for a narrow and arguably even warped view of what happened in the game Sunday.
For one thing, if you didn’t know how the Chiefs had drifted lately, that game would be seen simply as a methodical late-season victory that looked about the same as a lot of those in recent years.
In the context of the moment, though, it said something more.
Following three losses in their previous four games, including all the uncharacteristic but unseemly fury after the controversial ending against Buffalo, the Chiefs actually were at a crossroads.
Never mind the opponent.
After the chaotic last ending and the deep frustration it exposed, you had to wonder if they would galvanize or capsize.
Or if they would actually at last start to clean up some of the self-inflicted follies, the very core of what’s been hindering them, or basically just put all that off again like annoying chores they’ll never get around to.
Most to the point, would they finally start simply playing better — and get better by it?
Tentatively as it has to be framed until we see what it leads to, the Chiefs offered reassurance in a game they could have won 34-17 if they’d not just drained the clock out of sportsmanlike respect at game’s end.
They could have played a more sound game, of course. And you can only flinch thinking of yet another interception off Toney’s hands and the ball snatched away from Blake Bell for another pick.
But there was much more to be encouraged about than brood over.
Stuff of substance, like urgency over lethargy from the start after falling behind double-digits in each of the preceding three games.
Let’s count some of the other ways:
*Consider that Patrick Mahomes played his most crisp and sharp and productive game in weeks — even with the interceptions that belong more on Toney and Bell’s ledgers than his — and reminded that his considerable will is infectious.
*For just the second time this season, the offense had as many as six explosive plays (going 20 or more yards) — even as it again flexed a new-and-improved third-and-short game by extending its streak of successful conversions to 11 straight before it was snuffed out with a sack of Mahomes in the fourth quarter.
*Rookie receiver Rashee Rice continued to evolve from “he’s really going to be good” to … he’s really good right now. With nine more catches for 91 yards and a touchdown on the nifty goal-line gadget play, Rice has established himself as a compelling complement to tight end Travis Kelce.
While the Chiefs still need another receiver to emerge, lost in all the fretting is that through a 14-game resume Rice has virtually matched the man he theoretically is replacing in productivity.
Last regular season, JuJu Smith-Schuster played in 14 games for the Chiefs with 78 catches for 933 yards (12.0 average) and three touchdowns. He was second only to Kelce on a Super Bowl-winning team.
Having played in the same number of games to this point, Rice has 68 catches for 754 yards (11.1) with seven touchdown receptions — a Chiefs rookie record — and figures to pass Smith-Schuster over the final three games as he further comes into his own.
*The defense, so stellar much of the season, delivered a key turnover (Willie Gay’s interception), three more sacks to stay near the top of the NFL and allowed just 206 yards by the Patriots.
Yep, New England has the worst offense in the NFL. But the 17 points allowed is in line with the Chiefs’ season-long yield of 17.5 points a game — third in the NFL. It’s still something to get used to after the offense carried this team for so long, but it’s an asset that has won games for the Chiefs and can win more.
*Then there was the matter of penalties, a season-long albatross for the Chiefs. With 83 in their first 13 games, they are in the bottom third of the NFL in that category. On Sunday, they finished with a season-low two for 15 yards … though the count was minimized by several declined calls and another offset by a New England foul.
All of which propped them back up two games in their pursuit of an eighth straight AFC West title — and even kept them in semi-contention for the No. 1 seed in the AFC and a first-round playoff bye.
Now, they’d almost certainly need to win out to get that. And they’d need some cooperation from Baltimore (11-3) and Miami (10-4) — each facing thorny stretch runs.
It’s also a good time to remind that every AFC team has looming issues or vulnerabilities, like Baltimore quarterback Lamar Jackson’s postseason record (1-3 with three touchdown passes and five interceptions and 68.3 cumulative quarterback rating) and Miami’s inability to beat teams with winning records — 0-3 with its 10 wins over teams with a combined 45-95 ledger.
None of this means anything is fixed or solved or cured for the Chiefs, per se, and no doubt they’re still a work in progress.
Because we’ve seen too much season-long flux to assume anything, and there’s plenty to resolve.
That includes how, even if, to further deploy Toney, reconciling alternatives in the passing game and alleviating the gnawing turnover issue (24, tied for fourth-most in the NFL.). If those fumbles had been lost Sunday, this might feel a lot different.
But the Chiefs still made at least fleeting and incremental progress Sunday.
In a season marked by becoming a disheveled version of their recent selves, they scrubbed themselves up and seized more control of what they can control — a trait that will be the key variable going forward.
It will be an entirely different degree of difficulty in the postseason, of course, and the real measure of what any of this means.
But until then, the bridge to maximizing that is how they keep cleaning up their habits and execution in the weeks to come against teams with an aggregate record of 19-23.
They won’t play a team, in other words, that will give them another signature victory.
But that doesn’t mean this isn’t a crucial time to become what you want to be.
And the imperfect but improved effort against the Patriots can be the start of more steps from which to build.
At least if this group is as into all that as its recent predecessors … and more than it’s shown much of this season.