pretty much

A work in progress but I can't say it looks much better than last year at this point.

This defense is going to be a work in progress for awhile, when you change this much it will take some time.

You have a new defense, and we have a new offense. Granted, we pummeled Miami,and not the Patriots, but the Jags aren't Super Bowl material, either.

Will be interesting in 2 weeks.

Improved, still needs a lot of work. Tackling seemed better.
C-

The defense knocked out their starting QB with a big hit by Jones and Clark, didn't allow Fornette to go over 100 yards rushing and held the Jags to 13 points for most of the game until it was already over.

The Foles TD was basically perfect coverage by Fuller- pretty hard to defend that. Minshew was dumping the ball off on most every pass except a few lucky ones on a blown coverage. It was hot and the D was also playing together for the first meaningful game.

The Offense scored every time we had the ball until the clock ran out to end the game.

Not sure why people are treating this as a loss and the D still sucks?

Spot on, but yeah room for improvement

The offense is the reason Fournette stayed under 100 yards; he averaged over 5 YPC but the Chiefs offense took him out of the gameplan.

And what good is knocking the starting QB out (on a deep TD he completed, no less) when you make a 6th round rookie come in and look like Tom Brady? "Lucky completions into blown coverage..." is sure a convenient way to handwaive the same thing that happened under Sutton game after game after game last season. Blown coverage counts, man. And it's absolutely worth criticizing. Especially if the guy has time to scan the field because - again - the pass rush was nowhere to be seen.

The defense played poorly on Sunday. You can point to the new scheme and all that - fine. You can give justifications for it. But to try to deny it didn't happen is silly. The pass rush went nowhere, a starting RB who's team tried to void his deal last season went for better than 5 YPC and a no-name QB with a handful of no-name WRs set about shredding our secondary. What about those statements is even debatable?

"The defense played poorly but here's why and here's why it will improve" - is a valid line of discussion and there's merit to that position. "The defense didn't play poorly" - isn't. The defense played poorly.

It was mother****ing hot and both Defenses looked like shit. Wouldn't snap take this Week 1 game too hard.

Made it through the first quarter of A22 film. Defense doesn't look that bad at all. They had a mis-alignment on one of Fournette's larger runs. Pass rush is not bad, Foles wriggled out of a sack on the 3rd and long play, and they went max protect on the bomb to chark and the rush still got to him. Some tackling issues by CB's, but I think they can work out the kinks easily. A lot of the jags passes with the rookie were 3 step and hard to judge pass rush on those. i'll get through the rest of the game tonight.

FWIW (very little) -- PFF Grades for Sunday on the defense:

Wilson -- 83.9
Breeland -- 77.0
Thornill -- 69.5
Ogbah -- 68.6
Ward -- 65.1
Okafor -- 61.2
Jones -- 61.1
Mathieu -- 60.3
Fuller -- 58.8
Hitchens -- 54.8
Clark -- 54.0

I've said before that I don't think PFF is worth a damn for rank ordering a performance but I think it can be useful for establishing 'tiers'. For instance, I don't know that I can say that Thornhill was a tick better than Ogbah yesterday despite PFFs numbers, but in real time it felt like Thornhill and Ogbah were similarly impactful. That's a fine tier.

Wilson and Breeland were the two guys I thought actually played quite well yesterday and PFF gave them the two highest grades. When you're looking for general impressions, PFF can give you some solid datapoints.

And PFF said that Frank Clark was hot garbage yesterday. Was he the worst player on the defense yesterday? Well no, I don't think I can say that. But was he definitely among the worst players on the defense? Oh yes, yes he was. Against a rummy.

On the offense - a 91.6 for Watkins - yeah, that'll play. G'damn he was good yesterday. And yeah, the interior OL was exactly as bad as it seemed - Wylie, Reiter and LDT with a 54.6 - 51.2 - 50.7 respectively. Yikes - that'll get our cherub killed. You just cannot give them that kind of highway right up the middle. Everything else was about what you'd expect; a poor grade for Hardman, good grade for Mahomes (not elite, which I think we'd all agree with) and generally respectable grades elsewhere on the O.

Jax offense isn't good. Beating up on a cripple isn't a good barometer. Oakland looks more like a cripple now, so not a good measurement next week either. I have no faith in the Ravens repeating Sunday's performance. So you might not face a good offense until the Packers in week 8.

Fournette had a couple of late-game runs that padded his stats- he was pretty much a non-factor running with only 66 yards. Add in his receiving and he was still under 100 yards with a Huge fumble.

Jags were doing zip the first part of the game until that pass by Foles- which cost him the season. Fuller was right on his ass so I am not sure what else he could have done? This is the NFL- guys make plays.

As far as Minshew shredding us- most were dump-offs. Yes. the secondary had communication problems with 2 new safties out there that need to play much better. But most of those yards were in garbage time when Spags called off the dogs and was only rushing 4.

Now, how Mahomes dismantled the Jags "awesome" defense- that was a shredding. Chiefs D played much better than the Jags D and it was only the first game of the year- their first game together, on the road and it was hot as hell.

What more did you expect? :hmmm:

Let's not forget the D. almost had a Pick 6 on a batted down pass by Moustache Minshew.

That would have changed the narrative on his NFL debut.

Can you post a gif of Clark's INT - or is that against some kind of agreement?

The defense didn't exactly play very well, but I think they can improve. And they did seem to tackle better than last year.

They weren't good but they weren't last years ass highway to mc****sville.

So it's a decent starting point. They got off the field and held the Jags to 13 points. I don't give a shit about what a team does when they're down by 4 scores in the 4th quarter

He was a non-factor because they had to stop running. How thin do we really need to parse this out? It's not like they were just out there in the 4th quarter handing him the ball for garbage time yards - when the game mattered he was still getting the ball and in so doing he managed more than 5 YPC. Most RBs 'pad their stats' by larger runs and it was hardly trash carries that got him those.

The fumble I acknowledged, BTW. Wilson was the best player on that defense yesterday and that was a MASSIVE play. It deserves credit and got credit but it was pretty much an individual effort that doesn't obviate criticism of the rest of the unit. Wilson's play was a big time bright spot, though. If he can continue to show out like that after looking good in the pre-season, that would be one of those under the radar finds that great teams often find (and almost always need).

"Zip in the first part of the game..." - you mean their one drive? The Foles TD came on their second drive and finished a drive that had already moved them into FG range. I'd hardly say they had done zip. And yes, Fuller had good coverage there; never said he didn't. The problem was that Foles had that kind of time despite Clark being singled by a friggen TE. Yeah, Clark eventually got there - too late to prevent the TD. But hey, at least they got a hit on Foles and Jones injured him with a fall that any of use would've screamed bloody murder over had someone done it to Mahomes. THAT'S as close to a feather in their cap you can find - that time a borderline dirty hit injured the QB when our $20 million DE almost beat a tight end in time to prevent a touchdown...but didn't. Okay.


"Dogs" -- there was a difference? And wasn't that the point of getting Clark and why people love Jones? The switch to the 4-3 and Clark acquisition wasn't so we could send Damien Wilson and Anthony Hitchens on blitzes - it was so we can get pressure with 4. Do you really think we're gonna be sending Darron Lee and safeties after the QB most games? They should've still been getting there. "Only rushing 4" is going to be how this defense operates most of the time. It isn't going to be blitz heavy, nor should it be.

You really wanna compare the respective offensive units? The Jags offense sucks horrifically. You cite holding Fournette under 100 as though the guy is Walter Payton - I reiterate, they were going to try to cut this guy as recently as last year. The WR corps is fringe average on a good day. Of course the Jags D got beat up worse than the Chiefs - their offense sucks and the Chiefs offense is historically great. Duh.

No matter what anyone post, DJ- you think the D. sucked yesterday. You are viewing them with the most critical glasses possible and nothing anyone can say will change your mind. The Jags only had 13 points until late in the game when it was over. I will take that all year.

If Clark corals that batted pass for the Pick 6- it would have been an even bigger blowout than it was.

The Jags were never a threat to win against this Defense or Offense- that is the bottom line.

Speaking for myself, it's about expectations ... specifically from the premier acquisitions (Clark and Mathieu) and the rebuilt linebacker group playing against this specific team's offense.

This wasn't the Lambs or the Immigrant Blowjobbers. This was the Yaguars.

When I take into consideration the strength of their o-line and their skill players, I am very disappointed that they couldn't shut those guys down in humiliating fashion.

Mathieu had 2 tackles and 1 assist. Clark had 1 tackle total on the day. Other than Wilson and Hitch (5 tackles each), the linebacker group often looked confused and I don't think they had a single tackle between them.

Again, I haven't seen the All-22 and I don't know the calls, so what do I know? But based on the eye-test and the stats, I am far from impressed. It was the damn Yaguars with a barber-shop tenor at QB and there's no way (in my mind) that they should have been that effective.

FAX

Just leave him to it. He hates the Clark acquisition (compared Veach to Grigson for it, LMAO) and is going to be overly critical of him, fair or not.

The Colts apologists used the same excuse in the playoff game, Mr. BryanBusby.

Weather conditions are the same for both teams on the same day at the same place.

FAX

How do you have access to the All-22, Mr. Aspengc8?

It's not yet available on GamePass ... at least, I can't find it.

FAX

Good Lord, how is Ward ranked ahead of ANYBODY, much less seemingly half of his teammates on defense?!? PFF is ****ing worthless.

One could argue that you are the complete opposite. The bottom line is the bottom line.

A 6th rd rookie in his first NFL game tore our assholes apart. “But wait it was only short passes!” Well yes it was. That’s what Brady does so well and he’s our biggest (and only) competition. So what does that tell you?

The Chiefs offense scored every possession yesterday, but that isn’t sustainable against the best defenses in the league. We didn’t do that against the Broncos, Patriots 2X, Ravens, etc.

I absolutely hate it that Pat has the weight of the world on his shoulders to will this goddamn team to the Super Bowl without seemingly any help from the defense.

Ask Aaron Rodgers what that’s like. It’s happened to him for the last 9 years.

Clark sucked yesterday.

I don't have to be 'overly critical' of anything to point out that fact. You can come up with reasons for it if you'd like, but he was bad yesterday.

And those of you who have just ignored anything else this team does because they have Mahomes now so everything must be wine and roses are going to continue to refuse to critically evaluate that decision on its own merits.

Do you truly think Clark did anything yesterday to justify the cost in picks and cap? Was he even the 2nd best DE on his own team yesterday? What did he do at any point to suggest he was an impact player?

You can make an ad hominem out of this if you want, that's fine - but it's on you. You're the one refusing to examine what was in front of you, not me. When he plays well I'll absolutely acknowledge it.

He played like shit yesterday and I said that BEFORE any of the post-mortems came in. He was getting handled 1v1 by 3rd string OTs and TEs. "But the heat!!!!"

Fine - it was hot. But he was bad. If you can't acknowledge that then I don't know what else to say.

I think if Bob Sutton's defense allowed 5 yards per rush, over 10 yards per pass to the tune of 430 yards total while giving up 5/10 on 3rd down, there would be far less optimism.

That's without throwing in "One of the NFL's worst offenses with a back up 6th round rookie QB."

KC won several games just like this last year. This is going to matter when you face a good offense.

I mean they could hold the Raiders to 250 yards next week and they'd still make me nervous. Grandpa Bob's defenses clowned the ****in' Raiders.

And their back 7 is still TERRIBLE on paper, which was the same problem they had with Grandpa Bob.

Yeah, Ward being ahead of Fuller was a strange one to me and one that stood out.

It was interesting (and maybe telling) to hear Mellinger on 810 this morning (hurray! I can listen to sam again now that Pryor is gone) saying that there were problems with communication in the secondary all day. Maybe some of those broken coverages were communication problems?

Still doesn't make them not problems, still doesn't mean they didn't play poorly - but it does mean the improvement could come a little faster. It could also speak to my earlier question as to how Ward got that bad, that fast.

But the first deep pass to Chark sure seemed to be nothing more than Ward getting destroyed. And not by anything clever either.

Ah, nobody said he was 'good'

Maybe settle the **** down?

Didn't I say "fair or not?" When did I ever say Clark wasn't bad? I thought he was pretty lousy. Just like the rest of the big guns on defense. Fuller, Mathieu, Hitchens, Jones. All lousy in my opinion. Just seems like you've got a particular hard on for Clark.

Bright side is the cheaper role guys like Breeland, Wilson, and Okafor played well enough that if the guys we're paying (or plan to pay) the big bucks to actually start to play up to their talents, we might not be DOA.

Week 1 takes are always funny as ever.

KC brought in two 'impact' defenders in the off-season, and neither of them made an impact.

I'm not going to over-react here because 'one game', but you didn't notice them unless you were specifically watching for them. They didn't stand out at all. For Clark that's bad, because they had scrubs playing tackle. Life should have been much harder for the QB.

Jones was getting good penetration in the 1st quarter, but after that? Blah.

Back up tackles and a back up QB with Chris Conley as their #1 WR and they shredded our guys. Thank god we have this otherworldly offense. We're gonna need it.

Very true but I am willing to give Spags D some time to gel since they only played like 2 possessions total in the preseason. If they are still playing like this by Week 8 I will be very concerned.

Yeah, there's no shit there at all.

Ask any of these folks if they'd be saying any of this is Sutton was back. They KNOW they wouldn't be.

Nobody's saying that this defense is doomed to be the worst in the league again. I'm just saying that they played poorly yesterday and any kind of objective analysis has to come to that conclusion.

Especially if you're willing to ask yourself how you'd approach it if the offense HADN'T stepped up yesterday or if Sutton HADN'T been fired. Anyone that honestly thinks they'd have defended this defense had Sutton still been running it or even if Mahomes had to leave, the offense stalled and the Jags ended up winning 26-20 are just lying to themselves.

FFS, I think this team is going 14-2 and winning the SB. I friggen love the potential of this squad.

But because I watched a pass-rush go nowhere and a run defense give up 5+ YPC, I'm just some angry hater or some other dumb shit.

One can criticize a decision, a play, a player, a unit, a game, a coach, any or ALL of that shit without deciding that this is now a 1-15 team. G'damn people.

I'm at the point where in today's NFL on defense, you've gotta have 11 good solid players. Especially if you have some guys who are gonna make impacts, you can't have holes anywhere.

Teams are too smart now and you just can't trot out Charvarious Ward's.

This front office has gone into 2 straight seasons with shit and ass at CB after trading away a troubled dude that was pretty good at it. If they can't get this figure out, well, IMO, they've had enough rope to hang themselves with on the matter.

"Overly" is a judgment. You can't say "overly critical" and then "fair or not".

Using 'overly' says it's not fair - full stop. It's one of those "Everything that comes before the 'but' is bullshit" sorts of things. Especially when your post effectively starts with "just ignore him, he's being a bitchy schoolgirl over Clark..."

No, I'm really not. I think Veach overpaid in terms of cap and capital. I've said that. I've also said that I think he can be a very good player here, his attitude may be just what we needed as part of the overhaul and that there's a clear path to this being a good acquisition.

And in his first shot, against a bad offense in front of a tepid crowd with an entire half where he got to go after a green QB protected by a 3rd stringer, he did nothing. That's no bueno and fair to point out.

Yes, it's Week 1 ... any rational person would take that into account. On the other hand, that's why this performance should be concerning.

This was our first look at the #1 defense with extended snaps playing against an offense that is not particularly scary (especially considering the o-line they trotted out there). If our brand-new marquee defenders are going to rack up a grand total of 2 tackles and 1/2 sacks against the Yaguars, something went wrong somewhere. Because that, my friends, is unacceptable. It was the Yaguars' first game, as well.

We're not talking about a high standard here. It was the Yaguars.

FAX

I do think though, we may need to recalibrate what we want or expect this offense to be.

They aren't gonna be the Ravens lite from last year (although I do think there's more talent on the D than it looked like and it's early) and they aren't really or shouldn't be expected to be.

Get a few stops, don't get gashed and turn the team over a time or two.

Maybe grow a pair and try to respond or just stay home.

It's a discussion board - you paying for my keystrokes, sweetheart?

I'll say it again... from what I see on paper it will take one helluva coach to get them into the top 20.

Right now it just looks like Grandpa bob's defense with a much worse pass rush.

Ummm you can't just explain Fournette's decent game against us away by saying it was just some big runs at the end of the game. Here are all 13 of his attempts.

-1
2
5
12
3
3
6
1
14
6
2
10
3

So take out his 3 big carries which accounted for 36 of his 66 yards. So 10 carries for 30 yards.

Now compare that to McCoys game. His 10 carries looked like this.

13
2
4
2
3
31
5
0
2
19

So 63 of his 81 yards came on 3 carries. On his other 7 carries he had 18 yards.


But you can't take away the long carries, so I'd say they both had pretty good games.

What's everyone's obsession with trying to convince themselves and everyone that the pass rush and rush D was good?

Maybe be less of an emotional bitch about it?

You all act like the D has been together for 5 yrs like they were under grandpa Bob. This was the 1st game with new coaches, scheme, and 7 new starters. They have played together about 4 drives in the preseason. They prepared for a deeper throwing not real mobile QB and ended up playing a check-down king that made AS envious. I'll take up 24 with 10 minutes to play every time. Lots of room for improvement, hell yes. Is it time to worry because Pittsburgh really sucks this year without their PITA WR and RB?
Lets see some more games before the Chiefs acknowledge there's no stopping NE and they should cancel the rest of the season and give the Lombardi to them now.

Yeah, I thought that was rather.......dubious. :spock:

I fail to see how I was being emotional about anything.

You're the one coming in here asking me center my chi or whatever. I'm felling just fine.

I reiterate, you're free to join a conversation or...don't. Seems like you don't have anything worthwhile to add so maybe use your time elsewhere.

To each their own.

Correct. A Defense that's actually good usually in Jacksonville got knifed with total ease.

Neither Defense did particularly well and while that's not indicative that the Chiefs Defense will actually be good, but maybe they're not bad like that performance yesterday would make you think.

It's okay to say the performance yesterday was not good, because it wasn't. But I think it's fair to say that we should see more before dropping the hot takes, yeah?

I think you would have been fine until the whiny shit about boy howdy you sure expect to see more from the shiny new DL.

It's a long season. Settle down, Francis. People were dropping like flies from just sitting in the stands LMAO

Fuller Mathieu Hitchens and Jones played better than Clark did. Also if you add up what we are paying those 1st four players it equals $26 mil per year and Clark is making $21 mil per year. I guess you should expect a little more out of Clark considering he's making 8 million a year more than Fuller Hitchens and Jones combined.

Nobody said anything about giving the championship the NE.

You tell me, talent wise, where you think this defense ranks compared to the rest of the NFL. Go ahead.

I mean, just having Clark, Jones, Mathieu, puts them not at the end.

It's not ****ing barren talent wise. It should be better than it was yesterday results wise.

I wasn't all that happy with the defense but I can see some bright spots. And we all knew going in that this defense would take several weeks to get up to their full potential. I agree with you about Clark, though. I was disappointed in his performance. Knowing the kind of professional he is supposed to be, I can imagine he is pretty disappointed in himself. Hopefully, we will see much better out of him in the remaining games.

They didn't last year, but are we sure they won't this year? I mean, ****, that defense will probably be one of the top 2 or 3 in the league this year and we just ran roughshod thru them.

My criticism is very specific ... isolated, in fact. It's restricted to these players in this game against this opponent.

As I mentioned, I don't know the defensive calls and I don't know who is responsible for what in any given situation ... that's why it's impossible to project future results from a small sample size in a vacuum of factoids.

On the other hand, we had two major acquisitions in the off-season on defense and neither one of those guys did anything more than the average JAG might do against an offense that isn't especially threatening (to put it mildly).

I expected more across the board. I'm a big-time homer, so hope springs eternal in my heart ... but IMHO, that defensive display was well below expectations and makes me worry that the fans have been over-hyped with camp bullcrap once again.

FAX

That's fine, but the guys who fill the other 8 spots matter. Teams attack weaknesses, not strengths, of a defense.

I think talent wise we're definitely bottom 10 if you look at the whole package. It's not a lot to work with. Bad players can hurt you more than good players help sometimes.

I'm not freaking out. They basically are who I thought they were. I expected one of the 10 worst defenses and I think that's what we'll get. KC is still a threat to anyone in any stadium. I just hope we don't lose a OT coin toss.

I love how so many people are getting butt hurt over DJs analysis. Truth hurts, huh? Yeah he's the one being emotional, not you lil chiefy homers.

He is.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Gotta play better defense individually and collectively. Thank god for a healthy outcome and first win being apart of <a href="https://twitter.com/Chiefs?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@Chiefs</a> kingdom. Thank you to all the dope fans who came out in support. Your appreciated.</p>&mdash; Frank Clark (@TheRealFrankC_) <a href="https://twitter.com/TheRealFrankC_/status/1170798328143142912?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">September 8, 2019</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Hopefully he takes that attitude and comes back stronger. We desperately need it.

[QUOTE=RunKC;14436415]One could argue that you are the complete opposite. The bottom line is the bottom line.

A 6th rd rookie in his first NFL game tore our assholes apart. “But wait it was only short passes!” Well yes it was. That’s what Brady does so well and he’s our biggest (and only) competition. So what does that tell you?

The Chiefs offense scored every possession yesterday, but that isn’t sustainable against the best defenses in the league. We didn’t do that against the Broncos, Patriots 2X, Ravens, etc.

I absolutely hate it that Pat has the weight of the world on his shoulders to will this.



The defense held them to 13 points until the outcome was pretty much decided. It created 2 turnovers and held their stud rusher to 66 yards and under 100 with a fumble. The Jags piled up some garbage yards but were never a threat to win.

I am not being a homer- just stating positive things they did, but I know that goes against the narrative that the D. still sucks.

I guess my expectations were much lower since it was the First game with several new players, playing in a new system under a New coordinator- on the road in the heat.

I highly doubt this is the High Watermark for this defense and they are only going to get worse.

Yeah, I just don't see that though.

I mean, Ward is probably a weakness. Other than that the starters should be a credible bunch no?

Get out in the 120 degree heat and run at full speed and see how long that works out for ya. Every report I got from people I know that went said it was miserable as hell at that game, and it has to be even worse on the field.

I'm saying lets wait till after next week, at least, before the hot takes and pitchforks.

Thanks for your useless dumb shit.

Leonard Fournette rushed 13 times for 66 yards and caught four of six targets for 28 yards as the Jaguars lost to the Chiefs in Week 1 action. He also had a soul-crushing fumble- the 1st in his NFL career.

So you say that is a good game? :spock:

I don't think three above average players is particularly good. Jones is probably great, but he's also not a hustle guy. Clark is a hustle guy, but probably not great. Mathieu is good, but not great.

The rest are average to below average players based on their resume. Obviously Thornhill is a mystery for now.

I don't think the defense is really more talented than last year, but the talent is more evenly distributed which will probably help.

LOL ... "hot takes"? "Pitchforks"?

I think you have the wrong guy. I haven't wielded a pitchfork since before they benched Ragland.

You can stand atop your voice-of-reason crate and speak in calm, sincere tones ... and more power to you. That's not going to change what happened (and how). Besides, the topic was; "Evaluate The Defense's Game #1" ... not "Engage In Pissing Matches With Fellow Posters Until Nightfall. Ready, Go."

Of course, we are all aware that this performance is in the books. The good news is that we got some tape of the 1s and the players have a chance to discuss how much (and where) they have to improve. The glass is half-full. I'm merely hopeful it's not half-full of walrus piss.

Next time out, let's agree that it would be better if our two, new, extremely expensive defensive acquisitions can combine for more than 2 tackles on the day against a similarly-talented offense.

FAX

Yeah, I can't get there.

DL -- we have a LOT of talent here and a lot of depth. I think we're in the top 10 on the DL

LBs -- This is just such a hard group to evaluate because everyone uses their LBs so differently. If you consider a 3-4 team's edge rushers more along the lines of DL (as they're used that way) then 'LB' means primarily your off-ball linebackers now. For us that Hitchens, Wilson and Lee. If Wilson continues to play as well as he has and Hitchens can give us a credible performance in a scheme he's more comfortable in, I think we have...okay overall talent. Not great, not abysmal. And more critically, it's within the margin for error either way. It will play given what we ask of the LBs.

DBs -- Well I thought Breeland played a damn good game and I think Thornhill flashed the talent that made him the camp standout, despite some rough edges. Mathieu disappointed and some combination of Fuller/Ward (depending on how you apportion the failures) were a bag of smashed assholes. But outside of maybe 5 teams, EVERYONE is struggling to find good DB play. Are we really that far outside the norm there?

In terms of pure talent, this can/should be a mid-pack defense. That's why yesterdays outing was disappointing. It wasn't because they sucked and I expected them to. It's because they sucked and I didn't expect them to.

I texted my buddy prior to kick that I thought we'd win this game 35-21. This is a tough team to play defense on because there will almost always be a late garbage time score and I fully expected that. I expected another sustained drive and then another 'busted play' kind of TD from the new scheme. 21 was going to be a fine performance in my eyes and 26 isn't THAT far removed from it.

It wasn't the final outcome that bugged me - it was the component parts and how some of the more critical ones performed. The upshot is that some of the more talented guys are the ones that really struggled (Ward notwithstanding) so you hope that those guys play to their track records going forward and the team sees significant defensive improvement from here.

It's not impossible or even unlikely, IMO.

I'm gonna say middle of the pack. The talent is there for the most part, it's just giving them time to adjust and play together. Depth in the secondary and linebackers is bad but few teams out there have good depth players throughout. There really isn't as much difference between the best and worst player in the NFL as people try to make it out to be. They are all great athletes with skills or they wouldn't make it onto the field. Coaching and schemes make more difference and that takes some time to implement or at least more than 1 training camp and 1 regular season game. IMHO. All I'm saying is if they are still bad after the midway point then it might be time to get nervous, not now.

If they played all 16 games in extreme heat, you'd have a point. It's like getting pissed at the QB for not getting 400 yards and 4 TD's in the snow.

If you guys want to not accept that than knock yourselves out over it. It's about as silly as crowning Ryan Fitzpatrick league MVP after Week 1 2018.

Now once again, it's perfectly fine to say it wasn't a great performance because it certainly wasn't. But there's enough evidence on the tape to say, well lets give them some benefit for at least a couple of days before going all BOY HOWDY I SURE EXPECT MORE.

Sometimes a little patience is good.

Claiborne can't get here soon enough.

Leonard Fournette is a 'stud rusher' in the same sense that Ward is a 'stud Corner'.

Dude averages 3.7 YPC for his career. He was at 3.3 last year and was on his way to healthy scratch territory. Any sort of in-depth analysis of the Jags offense last season was that it was less efficient and less productive with him on the field than it was with TJ Yeldon.

Fournette ain't good, man.

The Jags were never a threat to win. They shouldn't have been - the Chiefs are MUCH better than they are. And winning in a cakewalk with a 1-footed QB and your top offensive weapon injured makes that clear. Especially when the pass-rush DIDN'T perform.

But the Chiefs are a contender and when the SB is your bar to clear, everything should come with heightened importance. The Cardinals can go out there and tie the Lions and claim a moral victory because their rookie QB didn't puke on his shoes. The Colts can go out there with Brissett, push the Chargers to OT and be pleased with their performance. Because neither of those squads are relevant.

The Chiefs...well they need to see where they were struggling and ignoring some of the issues from yesterday because they hung a W doesn't help there.

On a positive note, Nate Taylor talked about it in his article today and the defense knows they weren't good enough for sure.

Do you think many NFL running backs would've looked like world beaters if Blake Bortles had been their QB?

We recognize that the Chiefs can rotate any running back in with some success given their weapons and coaching, so it only seems natural that Fournette should actually get some uplift given the abysmal supporting cast.

I would take Fournette over Williams and McCoy on an apples-to-apples talent basis without hesitation.

Sounds like Jones and Clark were double teamed most of the game.

Was just going through that part. I'll be curious to see if anyone does a breakdown. I saw Jones getting doubled a lot but at most I saw an occasional chip on Clark.

Just look at the clip on the sack from Ogbah - exactly what the **** was Clark even trying to accomplish there? He literally just puts his head down and pushes into the LT's chest. Doesn't see what he's trying to find, doesn't even try to use his hands to hand-fight.

He just rushes upfield, the LT does a basic kick-out and Clark decides it's time to look like Allen Bailey and do...nothing. And no, there was no double there (the double was clearly on Jones) - it was just a 3rd string LT taking on Clark and fairly easily removing him from the play.

Yeah, he needs to get a LOT better.

Here's a tweet of the sack:

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Emmanuel Ogbah (<a href="https://twitter.com/EmanOgbah?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@EmanOgbah</a>) beats Jawaan Taylor with the cross chop/club/rip. Sacks the QB! <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/PassRush?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#PassRush</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Chiefs?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#Chiefs</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/ChiefsKingdom?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#ChiefsKingdom</a> <a href="https://t.co/2J7RaBJyfT">pic.twitter.com/2J7RaBJyfT</a></p>&mdash; DLineVids (@dlinevids1) <a href="https://twitter.com/dlinevids1/status/1170778961288163328?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">September 8, 2019</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

I mean c'mon man...what exactly was that?

For much of the game they looked like last years Defense however this years defense unlike last years made some stops at a critical juncture where last years defense always found a way to blow a big lead making the game close and the offense would have to go out and win it again.

I think this defense will improve but waant the argument as long as it's a little better than last years that's good enough?

I must be reerun cause I sure thought Wilson , hitchens was linebackers? Had I been right about that by your calculations the linebackers would have had at least 10 tackles . In a 4-3 isn’t three linebackers on the field?

Theres no defending that play BUT he did draw I believe 3 penalties in the game and had a pick.

They didn't play much base, Hitchens played 100% of the snaps, Wilson was at like 85 and Darron Lee played like 10 plays as the 3rd LB.

I mean, he bull rushed him backwards 3 steps?

Looks like he wanted to go outside but saw the chip coming and just put his head down and bull rushed.

Looks like he tried a basic bull rush. But maybe he was keeping an eye on the RB about to peel off

He needs to be able to punish teams for what treating Jones like they do in that clip.

SNR referenced how Jones was getting early penetration. I almost wonder if they didn't start sliding protection towards Jones and away from Clark once they saw that Clark wasn't really doing anything out there.

I don't expect 20 sacks from Clark but he has to be a credible enough threat that teams can't abuse Jones like they do in that clip. I mean the poor dude has no shot if he's gonna get that kind of attention.

And if Clark can't punish them for that kind of mediocre talent at OT, Jones is gonna get that kind of attention on every snap. It'll be a long year for a guy entering FA and don't think for a minute he won't see that play when they're running film.

Very few guys will just defeat a double team (I mean, you'd think for $20 million Clark could, but I'm just piling on now), but he at least needs to be good enough against a single blocker to draw the double on fair occasions. Clark needs a lot more help than he got there and the Jags essentially treated Clark on that rep like he was Breeland Speaks.

He tried to jump or something it looked like, had he just kept pushing he pushes the LT into the QB.

I'm not exactly overly joyed by the deal, but I think you're being a bit overly harsh here DJ.

This is the when the Patriots have the annual loss in Miami and patsfans lose their minds and the Patriots go to the SB anyhow.