KC Chiefs’ latest absurd win has a new meaning, and it’s not reassuring
If you’re willing to squint and suspend disbelief and fully embrace the notion that you make your own luck, there’s a smidgen of a case to be made that the Chiefs’ latest wacky win wasn’t so much because of a fluke as because of a nimble response to it.
And that they didn’t eke past visiting Las Vegas 19-17 on Friday just because of the slapstick act with 14 seconds left: Raiders center Jackson Powers-Johnson snapping the ball off quarterback Aidan O’Connell, who was looking away when it arrived, making for a fumble and a scramble from which Chiefs linebacker Nick Bolton emerged with the ball at the KC 37-yard line.
After all, the Chiefs practice finding the ball in that situation — albeit in what Bolton called “little drills” that they tend to make fun of — and they’ve made a dynasty by staying poised amid mayhem and resolute when it looks like curtains.
All of that has just been infused into the franchise’s DNA, we know by now.
How else can you account for winning 17 of their last 18 games and improving to 11-1 and clinching a playoff berth a day after Thanksgiving while making virtually every game a distress signal?
How else do you explain setting an NFL record by winning the last 14 one-score games they’ve been in and having a meager point differential of 54 this season?
“Chaos. Chaos. No other way to describe it,” safety Justin Reid said. “That’s what makes football so fun, man. Anything can happen at any moment. You’ve just got to be prepared for the moment.”
While Reid was speaking specifically of the last play, the word “chaos” lingered in a broader way.
Because before that play, disorder and confusion were the prevailing signatures of their latest submission to the theater of the absurd.
Only last week, I felt like murmurs of their impending demise were greatly exaggerated and, essentially, that what wasn’t killing them was making them stronger.
In large part because that’s been a pattern for years now.
But you couldn’t watch this game and not be jarred by how off-kilter the Chiefs were against a now 2-10 team that gave them such a comeuppance late last season it should still leave an unsavory taste in their mouths.
For all the last-minute reprieves these Chiefs have conjured, including basically beating Baltimore by a toe’s length and a walk-off blocked field goal against the Broncos, this was the first time I remember feeling like they played a downright losing game and got away with it.
On offense, to be sure, where a beleaguered offensive line surrendered five sacks as it could only muster one touchdown against a Raiders team that entered the game giving up 28.5 points a game (28th in the NFL).
But particularly on defense against the Raiders, who came into the game 28th in yards a game (292.6), 29th in yards a play (4.71) and 32nd and last in rushing yards a game (74.6).
Against the Chiefs, the Raiders amassed 434 yards, averaged 6.9 yards a play and rushed for 116 yards.
In his 13th NFL start, O’Connell completed not merely the longest pass of his career (a 58-yard touchdown pass to Tre Tucker) but five of his six longest, according to NFL Next Gen Stats.
Most to the point, with the Chiefs leading 16-3 in the third quarter the defense gave up insta-touchdowns on back-to-back series to change the entire dynamic of the game.
While it’s true that the first of those came two plays after a 68-yard kickoff return gave the Raiders the ball at the Kansas City 26, the defense also was free to defend what became O’Connell’s 33-yard touchdown pass to Brock Bowers.
And, for that matter, not to allow the 58-yard TD pass that gave the Raiders a 17-16 fourth-quarter lead that practically muted the stadium.
It would be one thing if this defensive day looked and felt like a blip.
But this comes after a previously staunch D unveiled its two worst performances of the season, against Buffalo in a 30-21 loss and Carolina in a 30-27 victory, thus reminding me of the old journalistic motto:
Twice is a coincidence, but three times is a trend story.
Part of the faint upside here is that you didn’t sense any denial about this.
While the Chiefs clearly weren’t apologizing for the victory — no asterisks in the NFL, Reid said — you can’t say anyone was exactly basking in this.
As he spoke afterward, defensive lineman Chris Jones broached the topic himself.
“Gave up a lot of errors today; last game, also,” said Jones, who sighed and noted that included giving up several long passes.
Now, it bears mention that the unit did some fine things.
Among them, sacking O’Connell three times (two by Jones, one from George Karlaftis) and making a pivotal fourth and 1 stop at the Kansas City 30 (Bolton and Charles Omenihu in his return from a 2023 season-ending torn ACL) to start the second half.
It’s also true that they’ve been dealing with some flux in the lineup, particularly with a variety of struggles at cornerback, and that Omenihu figures to be more of a factor the longer he’s back.
For that matter, defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo’s defenses have tended to peak late in the season because they’re complicated and take time to master.
But it’s also hard to tell where the relief if coming from in the secondary.
And it’s telling that when I asked Jones whether his biggest takeaway from the game would be those such moments or the mistakes, he said “mostly the errors.”
Because their ability to fix what he called correctable “self-inflicted wounds,” including his own two offside penalties among a spree of others, is going to be vital to any hopes the Chiefs have of making history with an unprecedented Super Bowl threepeat.
For his part, Reid suggested the issues are a “couple simple things” and about “just staying on top of some coverages.” He wasn’t being dismissive, just pointing to his belief in their capacity to keep addressing the problems and improve.
“I don’t think it’s anything to get ready to abandon ship over …” he said. “I think that it’s easily correctable across the board and that we’ll make those corrections and continue to get better.”
Or the wrong kind of chaos will prevail.