When we got the ball we matriculated the ball well enough, with Rashee Rice playing phenomenally and our back-up backs doing well enough to run the ball.
But Patrick Mahomes was not on. First he missed Xavier Worthy in the end zone by not leading him enough, then when we got to the red zone he threw a pick not leading Noah Gray enough to the corner. What is with that? Oh, and the interception was made by Patrick Simmons who used to torment Mahomes when he was with the Broncos.
With our second drive we were matriculating just fine, and we completed the drive with a nice TD throw-&-catch from, who else, Mahomes-&-Rice.
Ahh, but while our run defense was doing really well bottling up Bijan Robinson, we gave up the big pass play. We failed on a nice blitz call and Kirk Cousins hit Kyle Pitts for the big play just before a Falcons TD. We can meticulously matriculate on offense all day long, but if any good team gives up too many of those crazy big plays wherever they are whenever they happen.
Before the half we managed to get a couple of nice Butker field goals, one of which came after a nifty interception brought about by our tenacious D-line. This was a game we could take great advantage of the Falcons weaknesses on their O-line. They had two unfortunate injuries to those guys early.
We got the ball first in the second half and we pounded the ball really well, all the way down to the three, but then we just ran vanilla plays up-the-middle until on 3rd down Mahomes got flushed and threw an incompletion. Erggh. Old Andy Reid coaching rears its ugly head again. We got a field goal.
Our defense still kept shutting down the Falcons offense. The broadcast pointed out their QB Cousins uses play action really well to distract the defenders, but they simply didn't do much of that after they did it a bit to start the game. The color man even mentioned the Falcons could not really make anything happen with a simple pocket game, and on this drive they were stuffed yet again.
So there we were again on offense, late 3rd quarter, and fortunately Andy did a bit more mixing it up. Carson Steele up-the-middle a few times, that was cool, and a nice end-around to Worthy all helping us get to the red zone yet again. But then a not-so-good flip pass to Rice almost got him killed. But then Juju came in to replace him and his experience and skill got him a nice underneath route Mahomes finished and we got the TD.
But then, the old ugly Chiefs kicking doinks came back to rear their ugly heads. Butler missed the PAT -- it clanked off the right upright. Oh brother.
22-14 us, all ready to start putting the hammer down.
But then, whupp, the Falcons then got two good drives going, the first they got a super-long FG, then the simply wore our defense down, making our guys tired, keeping Mahomes off the field. Oh joy. Thing is, they kept going for it on 4th down and at around the five they threw incomplete passes for the turnover on downs. I will admit, that one on 3rd down should have earned a PI call against our guy. It was close, but Bryan Cook did PI their tight end Kyle Pitts in the back of the end zone.
Well, we got ours as a result. The Falcons got the Chiefs to commit a 3-&-out. Our offense looked miserable when we could have started our own matriculation to close this one out. A vanilla run, a Mahomes scramble out of trouble, then a silly bad pass attempt to try to convert a 3rd-&-short. Guh.
Then our defense resumed being tired and bad. There is no way we should have gone 3-&-out. Still ahead 22-17 at the two-minute warning our defense still needed a rest. Interesting that McDuffie had a PI call against him that didn't happen. Buuut then our guy did a horse-collar, that's nice. So the Falcons were set up beautifully at the ten with a minute left.
Errgh. The sweating sweating sweating...
But Nick Bolton.
He had a fine game, getting banged up but playing very tankishly throughout -- and on 4th-&-inches he blasted through to stop Robinson to seal the deal. With everything they'd been through and everything on the line the D did the job.
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I thought I'd add a quick note about Kareem Hunt. With the injury to Isiah Pacheco the Chiefs went out and got him back -- I know, very weird. Right in the middle of Mahomes' inaugural year Hunt had all that stuff going with the domestic violence incident and then the lying about it to the Chiefs brass.
Gone.
This was extraordinarily disappointing because he was such a good player. This was the budding Chiefs dynasty and then, BAM, we lose a key component.
I just wanted to confess that yes, back then I was livid with the Chiefs. I'd written here and in the Fanposts at Arrowhead Pride how much they could have handled it better. No excusing what Hunt did, but a full release? No opportunity to make good?
Yeah, I was too angry. My red-&-gold colored glasses got in the way as they often do.
But then, now he's back? Everything's better now? Right now I'm thinking, um, that's great! The Chiefs are saying he's made good in his time with the Browns and that overall he's a good guy. Um, that's great! He's not playing tonight because after just picking him up they put him on the practice squad, but let's see if he's got something left.
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On another note, they're saying so far this season there are a lower number of passing touchdowns. It is my theory that every once in a while the defenses do a really pretty good job on the whole of responding to what offenses are doing. They say there are more cover-two looks and that just makes it harder on offenses.
Okay, that's fine, but let's give credit to the defenses. The point is it may just not be the offenses that have suddenly become deficient in some way. So then, what does the NFL always do? Again, the NFL game goes for a number of years, defenses catch up, offensive production goes down... What happens?
They tweak the game a bit to give those offenses a bit more of an edge to keep the scoring up. For instance they'll make it harder for D-backs to defend with their hands or something. They'll make sure the quarterbacks are better protected in the pocket. Even tonight Chris Jones was flagged for a very questionable roughing the passer call. I don't think it was, but in the judgment of the officials he went just a bit too long into his hit on the QB.
I really don't mind those things especially when they do more to protect the players health on the field. One of the latest this year is keeping tacklers from employing the "hip tackle," dragging runners down risking leg injuries.
Nothing wrong with any of that! I think building the Chiefs defense was one of the most important things Brett Veach could have done over the last few years. But opening the game up is fine too. Offense returns and defensive coordinators need to get back to the drawing board and see how they can respond. I think that's pretty cool to be honest.
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This whole valiant attempt at a three-peat will not be easy. We've had very difficult challenges here but we've still jumped out to 3-0. Our running back situation could be better but Steele and Perine looked good enough, and Veach is working to secure all of that, again let's see what Kareem can give us.
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The photo is from Adam Parker at the official Chiefs site. Thank you.
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