Not even Patrick Mahomes can overcome the flaws the Kansas City Chiefs displayed Monday
With just over six minutes left in the fourth quarter on Monday at GEHA Field at Arrowhead Stadium, the Chiefs trailed the Las Vegas Raiders 20-7.
A predicament, to be sure. But over most of the last five-plus seasons of the Patrick Mahomes Era, faith would have sustained fans who’ve come to expect the routinely sensational.
Not anymore, though.
Not after the Chiefs had lost three of their previous five because of the same recurring issues.
And not after an often-incoherent offensive performance that several times drew boos on a day that ultimately featured the Raiders’ defense scoring as many touchdowns as the Chiefs’ offense did.
So they left by the hundreds, maybe the thousands. And while that had to be partly because it was Christmas Day, it also certainly was because many had discerned the increasingly obvious reality in what became a 20-14 loss — one that bodes ill for the postseason with the clock draining on a reset.
Even the two-time NFL MVP, instrumental himself in two shocking turnovers in seven seconds for Raider touchdowns, can no longer simply summon the will to overcome everything around him.
Because he can only do so much behind a struggling offensive line and with a group of receivers that collectively has such a hard time getting open and catching the ball.
That might not account for all of why he’s clearly been off-kilter himself, but it explains a lot of how it’s come to this: A generational talent capable of lifting a team, even a city, now contending with evident doubt about what’s around him and seemingly having that spiral into his own play and judgment.
That tracks with the developing trend of seeing him acting out more than passionately encouraging, a fine line that he normally has known just how to straddle and that reflects the discouraging cycle the Chiefs are in.
So rather than clinching their eighth straight AFC West title, the Chiefs fell to 9-6 — the most regular-season losses since Mahomes took over as QB1.
In the process, they provided a stark reminder of how hard it is to believe in this team despite a defense that’s among the NFL’s best.
About any time they take even a tentative step forward (like last week’s victory at New England), it seems they take two steps back.
As the frustrations become more and more visible both on the field and on the sideline, most jarringly between head coach Andy Reid and star tight end Travis Kelce on Monday, Mahomes is being challenged from about every direction.
And that’s just by the Chiefs, including some of his back and forth with the coaching staff to get plays in faster.
On a day he was sacked four times — including once each on the slapstick first three drives of the game that left the Chiefs with minus-10 yards — he had to wonder where he could safely set up.
It wasn’t immediately clear how much he scrambled behind the line of scrimmage, but it sure made me think of the 497 yards that Next Gen Stats reported he ran in the Super Bowl LV skunking by Tampa Bay.
Then there was the requisite gridlock with his receivers, including a couple routine drops and miscommunications. Even more distressing, especially at this stage of the season, was their strikingly persistent inability to get open.
Compounded by what now has to be considered trust issues, Mahomes ran several times when he might normally have tried to keep plays alive to pass downfield. In fact, he led the Chiefs with 53 yards on 10 carries.
Just the same, his judgment at times is skewed as he is left to re-calibrate that delicate line between making something happen and forcing it.
Like he did on the interception Jack Jones returned for a 33-yard touchdown seven seconds after Vegas’ Bilal Nichols scooped up the fumbled exchange between Isiah Pacheco and Mahomes for an 8-yard TD.
“I think as competitors you want to make a play happen,” said Mahomes, as ever the first to say he needs to play better. “But at the same time you’ve got to know the flow of the game. It’s something that I’ve tried to learn over my career.
“But those two mistakes at that moment kind of put us in a hole, and we weren’t able to climb out of it.”
Now the question is how, even whether, they can climb out of this to gain some traction into the postseason through their last two regular-season games: at home next week against the Bengals (8-7) and at the Chargers (5-10).
Even if they win each of those games, hardly a certainly given their fickle play, it’s hard to count on that giving them a running jump into the playoffs.
Because the issues seem about the same now as they did weeks ago. Only more so as time goes on.
After Monday’s game, Reid essentially said what he’s said many times before.
“That’s my responsibility (to) make sure I’m putting the guys in the right position to make plays,” he said. “And that didn’t happen the way that I wanted it to.”
He spoke again about being “just off a tick,” and he dismissed any concerns about Mahomes’ increasingly visible frustrations.
“He’s fine,” Reid said. “We’ve just got to get through. We get through this, and we’ll be alright.”
With so much going awry offensively, though, just what Reid was referring to was unclear.
Just like how to resuscitate the offense.
“You see glimpses of it,” Mahomes said. “You see glimpses of us moving the football. You see glimpses of us scoring in the red zone.
“It’s just that we haven’t consistently done it enough, game in and game out.”
Unless and until demonstrated otherwise, though, the glimpses are more mirage than truth for this team.
This story was originally published December 25, 2023 at 7:04 PM.