Patrick Mahomes says a chunk of the Chiefs’ ‘struggles’ are on him. But are they?

[dirk digler]

https://www.kansascity.com/sports/sp...246291560.html

Patrick Mahomes is endlessly self-critical, expansive when breaking down plays, and would rather shave his head than criticize a teammate. These are all good qualities in a quarterback, but they often conflict.

Like right now.

The Chiefs’ non-COVID-19 challenge of the week is making sure the strategy the Patriots just put on film for the football world to see does not become the accepted blueprint to slowing down the NFL’s most dynamic (though not best statistically) offense.

The short version: the Patriots dropped six, seven, and often eight defenders into coverage, lopping off deep throws and smothering intermediate routes.

It was, essentially, an exaggerated and better coached version of what the Texans and others have tried periodically but never to this much success. The Chiefs managed two field goals, three punts and a fumble in their first six possessions. They did not reach double figures in points until late in the third quarter.

The Patriots employ Bill Belichick, the greatest coach of our time, and Stephon Gilmore, the reigning defensive player of the year. Their secondary boasts next level intelligence that few opponents can match. Still, the Patriots present an interesting strategy.

Mahomes has taken responsibility. He did this late Monday night, and doubled down Wednesday afternoon.

“Just getting the ball out of my hand and finding the right reads,” he said about his challenge. “I said after the game — I didn’t even have to watch the film — there were some guys open and I wasn’t able to find them. That’s a great defense and we’re going against another one this week, so we need to accept the challenge every single play.”

Now, this doesn’t have to be said but here goes anyway: Mahomes’ standards are irrationally high, and he identifies opportunities through the organized chaos of NFL plays that the rest of us can’t.

But even after watching each of his drop backs four times — once live, once more on a replay, and twice each on the All-22 film — one miss stands out.

It came on the offense’s last snap of its first drive, the incomplete pass to a well-covered Sammy Watkins. Keep your eye on Travis Kelce, lined up tight on the left side and running a drag route to the right.

That should be a touchdown to Kelce.



But other than that?

Maaaaayyyyyybe Tyreek Hill over the middle here?



But even here, that’s a relatively tight window, and Mahomes was feeling pressure — against three rushers, which we’ll get to soon — so the decision to scramble isn’t without reason.

Again: in the time it’s taking me to write this sentence Mahomes has forgotten more about quarterbacking and the Chiefs’ offense than I will ever know.

But I’m just not seeing these missed receivers. In the Patriots game, what shows up on film is a lot of covered receivers, and too many snaps where Mahomes either feels pressure from three or four rushers or drifts in the pocket because he’s expecting pressure.

Those are real issues. On Wednesday, Mahomes brought them up.

“I thought the offensive line did a good job,” he said. “there are a couple times I was drifting a little bit. So I’ll do better at working within the pocket. Especially when they’re only rushing three to four pass rushers, I’ll put trust in them.”

The offensive line. Now we’re getting warmer. Mahomes is right about the drifting, by the way. He does it, and knows it makes the offensive line’s job harder. Linemen protect areas of the pocket, and doing hand-to-hand combat with freakishly athletic and strong men means they cannot turn around and adjust to the quarterback’s movements.

A lineman might be doing a fine job protecting a spot seven yards behind the line of scrimmage, but if the quarterback drifts back to 11 yards, and a few to the left or right, then the protection is broken.

The bad habit comes honestly. He has the gifts to throw from any platform, and practices those throws enough to be effective. But it is an issue that diminishes his talents. When he drifts, the defense’s job becomes easier.

But he does it for a reason. Mahomes has been pressured on 53 of 169 dropbacks, according to Pro Football Focus. That’s almost one out of three. Now, Mahomes is different than most. His passer rating under pressure is “only” 102.7, compared with 118.8 with no pressure.

Here’s the plot twist of this column: it’s not about those drop backs, and it’s not about drifting, and it’s certainly not about being less than perfect with where the ball goes.

The biggest problem here is that when Mahomes drops back, his options are more difficult than they should be. Defenses should not be able to put seven or eight guys in coverage routinely. The Patriots did it because the Chiefs could not force them to change.

The Chiefs have the NFL’s best passing and overall offense, according to Football Outsiders, but only the 22nd-ranked run game.

An obvious point: you’d much prefer the league’s best passing offense than its best rushing offense.

One step more: any time the team that employs Mahomes calls a play in which Mahomes does not have an opportunity to do something awesome it better have a dang good reason.

But at the moment, at least, the run plays are not forcing defenses stacked deep against the pass to change strategy.

This showed up particularly often against the Patriots. Clyde Edwards-Helaire was given 16 carries and managed 64 yards. That’s not good enough against a defense designed to encourage more running plays.

Basically, too many plays like this one, first-and-10 against a nickel defense spread wide and deep to stop the pass.



That play needs to work. Maybe Edwards-Helaire should’ve bounced outside, where he might have had more space. Maybe the blocking up front needs to ensure he doesn’t have to.

Either way, a team that drafted a running back in the first round to give the quarterback better options needs to be able to get ahead of the sticks when running on early downs against defenses focused on the pass.

Otherwise, what’s the point?

Edwards-Helaire acknowledged this Monday night.

“As far as running the ball, there’s some things we need to get cleaned up, from everybody’s standpoint and especially mine,” he said.

We live in a world that tends to exaggerate any point being made so let’s be clear: virtually any other team would trade for the Chiefs’ “problems” on offense. Nearly every other team would love to have Mahomes even if it meant he drifted twice as much and did it on every drop back. Also, Edwards-Helaire is an excellent receiver, and we’ll see more of that as the season progresses.

But these Chiefs have earned the burden of being judged by a Super Bowl standard. The Patriots’ strategy dragged the Chiefs below that line. The challenge now is to use the talent and brainpower already in-house to make sure it doesn’t happen again.