Until further notice, Chiefs’ loss to Texans marks end of the Mahomes mystique
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Chiefs’ loss to the Texans signals regression, leaving Kansas City with a 6-7 record.
- The Texans’ 20-10 victory punctures Chiefs’ mystique and ends AFC West dominance.
- Recent dynasty record keeps Chiefs alive mathematically despite evident decline.
For all the magic and milestones of the Mahomes Era, nothing quite launched it — and heralded the unfathomable possibilities — like the Chiefs’ 51-31 victory over Houston in an AFC Divisional Round game on Jan. 12, 2020.
With Kansas City abruptly falling behind 24-0 in the first half, the torture of ghastly playoffs past — and 50 years without a Super Bowl berth — surely was going to repeat itself. Perhaps in perpetuity.
So maybe it was apt that it was the Texans on Sunday night who administered the most disillusioning of jolts to what became a dynasty, puncturing any remaining mystique with a 20-10 victory that left the Chiefs 6-7.
Coming out of one of the absolute greatest eras in NFL history, the Chiefs now officially won’t win the AFC West for the first time in a decade and are left with a scant mathematical chance of making the postseason.
All the less so based on how they’ve actually played all season.
If it’s not a pause or even outright demise of the dynasty, you can sure see it coming into focus nearer over the horizon.
The only reason not to count them out altogether is because of the remarkable recent past — seven straight AFC Championship Game appearances, five Super Bowl berths and three triumphs in the so-called ultimate game.
But not in any way because of anything they’re demonstrating in a season on the brink underscored by the very sorts of things they used to do unto others being flipped onto them.
In keeping with the new reality, it’s the Chiefs who create much of their own trouble with the likes of dropped passes, turnovers, penalties, special teams gaffes, including Harrison Butker’s startling issues, curious coaching decisions and by simply not being able to come through in the clutch.
The team that won 12 games by one score last season, achieving an NFL-record 17 in a row over two seasons, is 1-6 in such games this season. And while Sunday wasn’t one of those, all of the elements that influence that stat were at play in a disastrous fourth quarter that began with the score tied 10-10.
With the defense swamping and flustering Houston quarterback C.J. Stroud and the offense gaining some traction after going scoreless in the first half for just the second time in a regular-season game with Mahomes at quarterback, it all unraveled.
Starting, really, with the puzzling decision by coach Andy Reid to go for it on fourth and 1 at the Chiefs’ 31 when it sure appeared the Texans were incapable of scoring on anything but a short field.
Moreover, the play-call featured an empty backfield — when running back Kareem Hunt has been so stellar in short-yardage situations that it would have seemed prudent to at least signal the threat of him running.
Sure enough, the pass to Rashee Rice was broken up, and the Texans promptly took a 17-10 lead.
It wasn’t over, though, until Rice dropped a fourth-and-4 pass from Mahomes to end the next drive, and it wasn’t over-over until a drive later, when tight end Travis Kelce deflected a pass into Mahomes’ third interception of the day.
Mahomes finished with a career-worst passer rating of 19.8 on the field where he made anyone watching feel like nothing was impossible as he led the Chiefs back in that Texans postseason game — the first of an unprecedented three straight playoff wins from out of double-digit deficits that gave the Chiefs their first Super Bowl victory since 1970.
With plenty more since.
And now a sense of collapse, at least in the near-term, that seems as improbable as what the Chiefs built themselves up to.
With their chances of making the playoffs flickering but not gone, it’s too soon to run the diagnostic or render an autopsy or whatever you’d call trying to make sense of what’s happened.
You could surmise that all the winning has caught up with them one way or another: the perpetual picking near last in the NFL Draft, salary cap limitations because of Mahomes’ well-deserve contract; the grueling schedules that go with winning in the NFL’s parity-dedicated scheme, the animosity and resentment of opponents.
But only a few weeks ago, it looked like they were playing as well as they had in several years.
Heck, even until recently, I figured this season’s team would have beaten last season’s edition — especially since it was finally whole at receiver and the offensive line had been shored up.
But now it’s all somehow disintegrated into something of a game of whack-a-mole, never knowing what issue is going to emerge at any given time.
Instead of the other way around that we all witnessed for so long: You couldn’t always comprehend how, but the Chiefs were going to find a way to win. Often spectacularly.
Like they did on the way to winning that elusive first Super Bowl in two generations. And, for that matter, like they did by rallying from double-digits down to win two more.
On Sunday, it seemed to be everything, everywhere all at once surfacing against them — including the jaw-dropping loss of a fourth offensive lineman in recent weeks when Wanya Morris suffered a knee injury on the first play from scrimmage.
Whatever happens from here, the Chiefs will have a lot of revamping and regrouping to do this offseason.
An offseason that as of now looks like it will arrive faster than it has since 2014, the last time the Chiefs failed to make the playoffs.
That wouldn’t mean this is all over.
But it sure would mean changes we can’t even understand yet, an entire new phase to be engaged and some mourning for the end of a magical time until further notice.