Why Patrick Mahomes isn’t the only solution to the Chiefs’ passing-game struggles BY SAM MCDOWELL SEPTEMBER 27, 2024 6:00 AM

The next thousand words began with an exercise delving into the relative struggles of Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs’ passing game. Began with an exercise devoted to a couple of questions.

What, exactly, is Mahomes referencing when he says he’s not playing good football? And how much of the blame for his numbers can be traced to the lack of production from Travis Kelce?

One at a time. On Mahomes: The reference is to his fundamentals, which I explained more thoroughly earlier this week. On Kelce: There are a variety of things at play, but, yes, one of them is that he’s a tick slower than he was last season. That tends to happen to soon-to-be 35-year-old athletes. It actually tends to happen much earlier to most of them.

Back to the exercise. Here’s how a large portion of that unfolded:

Fast forward.

Fast forward.

Fast forward.

See, an interesting trend developed over the first three weeks of this Chiefs season, particularly when placed in contrast to, well, literally every other season with Mahomes.

The Chiefs are running the football a lot.

As a first choice.

In fact, for the first time in the Mahomes Era, they are literally operating as a run-first offense, or at least a run-on-first-down offense.

The rushing plays don’t exactly help you evaluate the quarterback — hence the fast-forward button this week — but they do illuminate a perspective on how the Chiefs view themselves.

Kansas City has run the football on first down 55.4% of the time through three weeks. The average of Mahomes’ initial six seasons is 46.4%. Under this quarterback, they have never elected for more first-down rushes than throws over the course of an entire season, because, uh, why would you?

That’s changed. Whether their current pace will last, the Chiefs have made a significant jump over a three-week span, and it’s not the only spike. The Chiefs are similarly running more often on second and third downs too.

The third downs, the bread-and-butter Travis Kelce downs for years, have included only four targets to a future Hall of Fame tight end. They’ve included 10 rushes. For all of the conversation about whether Kelce has lost step, or whether he can still get open, or whether he’s too distracted to care about any of that, a reality has quietly flown under the radar: The Chiefs aren’t enthusiastic to find out.

Instead, they are often, or at least more often than the past, choosing a different route. A different security blanket.

A handoff.

Oh, and there’s something else you should know about this, because it’s kind of an important aspect:

It’s working.

At the onset of the summer, the Chiefs offensive linemen gathered for a meeting with position coach Andy Heck, and they specifically addressed this very topic. Heck challenged the group to get better leverage on running downs and to play with more physicality — basically, to treat it as every bit as important as pass protection (even if protecting Mahomes will always carry more weight).

“We definitely took it personal,” right tackle Jawaan Taylor told me. “When we started the offseason program, we wanted to take more pride in the run game. That’s been a mindset everyday.”

It’s hard to know, therefore, whether the run-game emphasis was part of the Chiefs’ plans all along — whether that deep passing game was a diversion — or whether they’ve found something that’s worked and they’re just simply sticking with it.

An educated guess? The latter.

Because it has worked. Chiefs running plays have comprised a success rate of 56.5% this year, per Next Gen Stats. That statistic, unaltered by the change from Isiah Pacheco to Carson Steele at running back last week, leads the league. Think of that. The Chiefs, as the best running team in the NFL. A year ago, the Chiefs had a 39% success rate, which ranked 19th in the league.

(A successful play, for reference, is one that gains at least 40% of the required yards on first down, or gains 60% of the required yards on second down or gets past the sticks on third or fourth down.)

The Chiefs are running more frequently than they have since Mahomes arrived in Kansas City.

The Chiefs are running more successfully than they have since Mahomes arrived in Kansas City.

That’s a pattern that embraces logic, right? The interior line has been dominant, particularly center Creed Humphrey and guard Trey Smith, so might as well use them.

The reality is only the Chiefs know their future game plans, but that they’ve spanned three weeks with a redistribution of their preferences is noteworthy. It’s just long enough to wonder if opposing defenses are among those taking the notes.

About that: They already have.

The Chiefs are facing a higher percentage of defenders in the box than any season under Mahomes — that is, defenses designed to address the run game — and that too is by a wide margin. In each of the past four seasons, the Chiefs have faced either the most or second-most light boxes in the league — that is, defenses focused on the pass — according to data on NGS. This year, they are middle of the pack at 17th.

The defenses, in other words, are creeping closer to the line of scrimmage.

Which brings up another particularly intriguing aspect of the development. The Chiefs spent their offseason hoping to return the deep pass to their repertoire, only to throw just four attempts in three games. That’s it. Two have gone for touchdowns, by the way.

They have to prove they can dink-and-dunk their way downfield, Mahomes will tell you, and then the back end will open up.

Sure, that’s one way. The short pass.

But the Chiefs have proven a willingness to exploit teams with another method that few expected. They’ve proven as successful as any team in the league in doing it. Can you imagine, by the way, that method not including the NFL’s best quarterback?

The Chiefs view it as a solution to what they’re facing — to help in the immediacy.

But it could be part of the solution to their passing game — for later.

Let’s not kid ourselves. That has to still be the objective. Open it up for Mahomes. For his receivers. Give them some space to maneuver.

Some space to, well, run.

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