Chiefs at Raiders - Week 13 - Record: 10-2

I'm telling you, it is there. There is some profound supernatural thing going on here. Many of my blog readers may chafe at that, or they may just stop reading. That's cool. But I've seen it too often. A team has some awful off-field thing happen and it just affects them adversely on the field.

I wrote a bit more about the Kareem Hunt thing at Arrowhead Pride this weekend. That post is here if you're interested.

But this was a game we should have won going away. We eeked it out with a very late touchdown pass from Mahomes to Conley to get the score from a ridiculously scary 33-30 to a slightly more comfortable 40-30.

But everything was off. You could tell. And while I think the Kareem Hunt thing was quite instrumental, if only because we had to scramble to get a relatively new run-game scheme together, it is just a thing that afflicts the Chiefs all the time. It is this thing Hunt. It is never really being able to have enough got-it to compete with the big boys when it counts. It is the NFL and its rich sycophants loathe having the Chiefs succeed.

There's something.

Again, we were playing a Raiders team that was atrocious, on both sides of the ball. We should have run roughshod over them. The 4th quarter was especially bad, even though they'd said this season the Raiders have a 70-something negative point differential in the 4th quarter, worst in NFL.

As we all know our defense is not the best, so we did allow the Raiders to get back into this game pretty easily. That was because, for one, Justin Houston has really lost a step, sorry, but it didn't look good today. Our run defense was miserable and we lucked out when they fumbled it away three times. It was also because yet again the officiating was horrifically bad against us -- what is new. They called PI's against us for the most incidental contact, and sorry, it does make a big difference. When the Raiders scored a late touchdown making it very close their receiver clearly pushed off, but no call.

Our offense stalled a few times, and while Spencer Ware and Damien Williams actually played very well, I can't help but think we would've been more proficient with Kareem in there. Sure you can scream until you're red in the face that he will never be back, I can't help but just amplify the point that we should never have lost him in the first place yet we did much because of the inane stuff that just happens to the Chiefs.

I can't deny that I hope our terrific talent, strong character, and resilient leadership overcomes that stuff. I'm always hoping for that for all the reasons I've shared so many times before: The Kansas City Chiefs must always play up-against-it.

Some very good things about today's game. Travis Kelce was Patrick Mahomes' go-to guy, and did he deliver. Those two kept making play after play, especially when we needed it most. They said Kelce had a career day in a number of categories.

Late in the game announcer Dan Fouts said we do really well on the "ad-lib plays." How about that -- a number of times I'd written here expressly hoping for Andy Reid to design plays just like that for Alex Smith. Now how frequently does Mahomes just squib out of the pocket and deliver.

Our offensive line is actually playing tremendously well. We're getting running lanes and fine pass protection. Again Ware and Williams actually ran pretty well.

Reid keeps up the innovation stuff. That wild wildcat touchdown by Ware started from a crazy formation, very fun to watch!

My favorite play of the game? With only about half-a-minute left in the 1st half Mahomes did his scrambly thing and hit Demarcus Robinson on the far side of the field reasonably close to the sideline, yet Robinson didn't run out of bounds! Instead he crisscrossed to the near side working hard to get a seam to try to score the touchdown. He did get out of bounds to stop the clock with enough time for Mahomes to hit Kelce for the TD, but I really liked the courage! Sammy Watkins didn't play and Tyreek Hill had a subpar game, but I'm telling you I actually really like Demarcus Robinson and Chris Conley and what they can contribute.

And Patrick Mahomes. He had four touchdown passes giving him 41 on the year. There are now only eight QB seasons of more. In fact here they are! It won't take long now: 43, 44, 45, 46, 48, 49, 50, 55. From Brady, Brees, Manning, Marino, and Rodgers. That's it.

On the broadcast they were saying things like this: "The Chiefs average 28 points by the 3rd quarter. That would be good enough for 6th in the NFL for a whole game." And then this one: "The Chiefs this year average 7 yards per play, that would be an all-time NFL record."

But this result was all we got from a game against this Raiders team? Yes a win is a win, and the Raiders were still a proud NFL team playing at home. I can't say I'm not concerned about playing a really good Ravens team next week. Then we've got San Diego right on our heels the following Thursday. Then we have to go to Seattle and they're playing great football.

Will we truly, fully, sufficiently overcome this Hunt debacle? We'll see.
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