Chargers at Chiefs - Week 17 - Record: 12-4

Well how about that. What a phenomenally exciting end to the regular season. As I posted a week-and-a-half ago, we Chiefs fans are tremendously blessed. We have had a number of wonderful regular season finales, we have. I can't help but think about that miracle New Year's Eve set of games in 2006 that got us into the playoffs. I think about two years ago when Patrick Mahomes in his first full game, also on New Year's Eve, led the Chiefs to the thrilling close win in Denver to close the season. Even just last year when we throttled the Raiders to ensure we got the bye then.

Thing is, now we need some wonderful splendid spectacular play in the postseason.

But that is for a preview post for later. For now, the joy. I did get to see the very end of the game when I was at a restaurant having lunch with my dad, and I watched on the big screen TV Damien Williams pull off a terrific twisting driving touchdown run to put the Chiefs up by 10 with just a few minutes left in the game. A mere few seconds after that the Dolphins Ryan Fitzpatrick rifled a touchdown pass to his tight end in the back of the end zone to put Miami ahead of New England 27-24 with less than half-a-minute left. The Patriots then just could not pull off another of their charmed wins.

We got the bye.

Watching everyone in Arrowhead and all the players on the sideline go bananas was really fun. Yeah, it seems odd: the fans can't see that extra Chiefs game this year and they're cheering for that, but really, you really do want the bye for extra rest and time to prepare. As it is we get the home game for the division playoff game in two weeks.

We'll need it too because we've got to try out a new free safety. We lost Juan Thornhill for the entirety of the postseason with that notoriously wretched ACL-tear. More on where we are with that in a preview post next week, but it is encouraging to see Juan already eager to work hard to be back soon.

As for this game, a couple of real quick shout-outs to people.

There's Damien Williams, wow oh wow, what a day. He had a number of grinding runs getting key yardages throughout the game, but his highlight reel included two spectacular touchdown carries, both of which saw him hammered at the point of attack, but he stayed on his feet and took them to the house. One of them went for 84 yards. He was also fantastic coming out the backfield catching passes.

I also want to give a shout-out to Steve Spagnuolo, our defensive coordinator, who has just done wonders with getting the most from the defensive players we've got out there. The thing that is most encouraging as we go into the postseason is that he was the defensive coordinator with the New York Giants in 2007 when they upset the undefeated Patriots in the Super Bowl, largely because of their defensive performance against Tom Brady and company. It is good to have him out there getting us tuned up for what we are all again hoping is a very deep playoff run.

Well yesterday it got pretty deep already with the stunning game results, and yeah, adding another fine chapter in the storied history of the Kansas City Chiefs. I like being able to say that because there is good reason to justify it. Four straight division titles, seven straight winning seasons, a record of something like 48-2 against division rivals over the past six years, something like that -- they even mentioned the team had set an NFL record for most total points in a two-year period.

Oh yeah it is all very very very fun.

More and more and more as we get ready for the postseason next week!

Playoff preview post then!
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Chiefs Game Tomorrow - Final Regular Season Game Versus the Chargers

I'm putting in this brief post because I'll unlikely be posting tomorrow after the Chargers game. Unless the Dolphins beat the Patriots to help us get that bye, something about as improbable as the Democrats inviting Trump to their New Years Eve party, the game is meaningless. We'll be hosting a wild-card game at Arrowhead next week against someone.

I'm sharing this because I'll be spending the entire day with my elderly dad on Sunday, and even if we happen to catch the game, which is unlikely, I won't have the time or capacity during that day to post. The day belongs to him. And pretty much after that it is a preview post, which will be pretty brief for obvious reasons.

Anyway, it is funny, the Chiefs could actually play the Raiders in that first playoff game. That would require the Chiefs, Patriots, Texans, Ravens, Colts, and the Raiders themselves to win tomorrow, and funny, all are heavily favored. Maybe the Raiders aren't because they'll be at Denver, but they're still good enough to win that one.

So yeah, wouldn't that be something. Fifty years after that amazing AFL Championship game in the '69 season, we could have a rematch.

Again, a playoff preview post to come early next week!
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Chiefs at Bears - Week 16 - Record: 11-4

Pretty copacetic tonight. The Bears didn't put up much of a fight. Not to say our defense wasn't stellar again, or our offense wasn't matriculating the ball down the field as it should. But the Bears were just dropping passes and slipping up just about every other play.

On the national broadcast they predictably did talk about the fact that their QB Mitch Trubisky was picked eight spots above Mahomes in the 2017 draft, but I've always thought Trubisky was never that bad. The Bears fans just don't like it that the Bears haven't been competitive this year. That's fine. It was interesting, however, that they showed a montage of Trubisky making similar fine plays at QB as Mahomes has made.

But really, I'm sure every Chiefs fan is perfectly happy with Mahomes. By miles.

It is simply because he's doing those amazing things so often, and commanding the offense with tremendous dexterity. To wit: On the first drive of the game, Mahomes threw a pass to Blake Bell for a 1st down, and he threw it so sidearm that it was practically underhanded. It had to be that way because the ball had to go under the defenders outstretched arms. Again, amazing.

We eventually scored a touchdown on that drive when Mahomes waltzed into the end zone from about 20 yards out. He could do this because the opponent's defense must do so much to cover so many people, they are so preoccupied with the coverage they lose track of the running Mahomes.

One of those critical components of the Chiefs offense is Damien Williams, and what a bonus to have him back in the lineup. After they gave the ball to Spencer Ware with the first few runs, they went to Williams and he was dynamite. He even caught a touchdown pass for us on the evening.

One thing I really liked was seeing Mahomes throw a terrific 3rd-&-18 pass to Tyreek Hill to get the 1st down, and in the replay he had his tongue hangin' out. That was significant to me because my grandfather, a very respected MD in Kansas City, used to do all the handyman things around the house or magic trick things for his grandkids with his tongue hangin' out.

He was one of the reasons I'm such an impassioned Chiefs fan, of course. Neat to enjoy that moment tonight.
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Chiefs Above the Masthead

I happened to catch this image at the very top of the NBC news website. Typical ad for NFL type things, but I did a double take -- as in two Chiefs appearing in the promotional photo. Usually when they splice these player images together for these kinds of things they'll have an equal representation of the top players in the game, usually most of them are from the large market-media darling teams, for sure. But hey, whaddya know about this?

Among the five, three of them are a Patriot, a Charger, and a Ram -- Boston and Los Angeles teams -- but the other two are, yes, Will Shields and Tony Gonzalez. How about that.

Been doing some reflecting on this Chiefs team of late, and while I bilge my standard Andy Reid reproof at least once a year, I can't say that my Chiefs Kingdom perspective right now isn't pretty danged great. I mean, yeah, I do get too emotionally wrenched by this Chiefs thing, but ya know? Just not letting what seems like the inevitable playoff brutality get to me is quite liberating.

The secret again is just enjoying the moment. Really, when you think about it, whatever has happened in January, you do realize that every fall for most of the years since Carl and Marty took over in 1989 have been pretty awesome for the Kingdom? Really, very awesome. As Chiefs fans, when you think about it, we are pretty blessed.

I mean, yes, it is great to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Chiefs Super Bowl win, but how about the 30-year anniversary of that 1989 year? Really, that was just as much of a benchmark of tremendous Chiefs success through the entire history. Since that year, the Chiefs have had winning regular season in 21 of them. How many teams would kill for that kind of success? In that time we've compiled a record of 274-219-1, a winning percentage of .555. That is amazing, considering this includes a pair of 2-14 seasons and a pair of 4-12 seasons. That -- is amazing.

Point is, even if we haven't done the winning in January, we get to enjoy an entire fall of excellent play on a regular basis and with it always is the hope that we'll do exceptionally well in the postseason.

There is a lot to be said for that.

This year is no different, seeing how well our defense has steadily improved, seeing what we've got in Patrick Mahomes and his receiving core. It is wonderful just to enjoy this now.

We get to see from top to bottom the pieces we've got in place that make the Kingdom so fun.

This past Sunday Clark brought over Dick Vermeil to bang to pre-game drum. That whole pre-game drum thing? They've now got a special area up in the middle of the stands for that now -- I mean, that is just flat-out sublime, that they would fix all that up. Thing is, before the game Vermeil was allowed to give the team a pep talk.

Get out.

I mean, that is just beyond the pale -- beyond the pale of awesomeness, really. Vermeil is such a winning guy, he's got winning infused in every cell of his being. I can't even imagine what it was like, but I heard it had all kinds of "You guys never had to work as hard as we did" -- but in a good way, you know! But he finished with how proud he was of those players and the Kingdom.

Here's the thing. Yesterday we snatched Terrell Suggs off waivers. Wow. He was made available because the Cardinals weren't going anywhere, so they wanted to let the 37 year-old Suggs get a one-last chance somewhere else. Other teams not bound for the playoffs that could have had him didn't bite because they'd be committing themselves to a tail-end-of-career defensive stud for garbage-time season play. So four teams made a claim on him, and the team with the worst record of the four got to have him.

With their four losses so far on the season the Chiefs won the prize.

Think about that. Because the Chiefs lost that terrible horrible no good very bad game a few weeks ago against the Titans, we had that one extra loss to allow us to pick up a guy who may just be the key to shoring up the defensive front for the deep playoff run. I mean, we wish it didn't happen because Sunday we lost Alex Okafor for the year, and we'd already lost Emmanuel Ogbah and Breeland Speaks.

Brett Veach is right on top of all this. He's the man. He's gettin' it done in the front office, and maybe, just maybe Andy Reid will have the playmaking acumen running at its highest octane come playoff time that we're so blistering opponents they won't have a chance to do anything against us.

Just like the Christmas time story. No matter what happens later, right now as we celebrate that greatest joy of all, Christ's birth, Chiefs fans can have "visions of Super Bowls dancing in our heads."

Happens every fall.

Very very nice indeed.
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Broncos at Chiefs - Week 15 - Record: 10-4

These games are the funnest. Lots of snow, and during the game. A lot of times they've covered the field so if it isn't snowing during the game it just isn't there.  But today! Awesome.

Most times that snow can be debilitating to a high-powered offense, but it can also have an impact on the defense. The Broncos simply could not do anything with our ability to throw the ball down the field and at least get into scoring position.

Mahomes was terrific, 27-for-34, 340 yards, two TD passes. He threw to Kelce all the time. Hill had two touchdown catches. Watkins showed he's still excellent despite what everyone has been saying. Even Robinson and Hardman did very good things out there. It makes me wonder, why run the ball at all. Yes we didn't have Damien Williams again, and if we could use LeSean McCoy more frequently I think we'd be okay. Darwin Thompson's getting some reps, that's good too.

But still. Mahomes is getting it done through the air no matter what we do.

If we can just build a huge lead like we can, easily, like we did today, we won't have to worry about a 4th quarter. Still even when way ahead, we've got to run the plays with assertiveness...

We're also still getting too many penalties on big plays! Are we not disciplined enough?! A splendid Mahomes-to-Kelce big pass play was wiped out by an illegal block. Mathieu intercepts a pass on 4th down for a stop close to our end zone, but we get defensive holding. Lucky we got Thornhill intercepting the very next pass to make it moot.

Another thing is we are just leaving too many points on the field in the red zone. I heard Mitch say Harrison Butker has the NFL record for most points by any player over his first three years. This is (a) because we do have such a potent offense, but also (b) he is kicking too many field goals when we get close to the goal line. The Chiefs by far have the most touchdowns from beyond the 20 this year. Easy to see why. We have the weapons to stretch the field, it is an awesome array. But what about just pounding it in when close?

Sure enough though, the 4th quarter starts, we have the ball, we're driving, doing great, then Patrick scrambles, scrambles, scrambles -- and throws a pick at the goal line. Errgh. I must say his scrambling earlier in the game to buy time to connect with Watkins on the two-point conversion, that was a thing of beauty.

So what did we do today in the last five game-minutes, even in one like this ahead 23-3? When that five-minute time period started, the Broncos had the ball, and on 4th down their QB threw an incompletion they challenged as pass interference, but it wasn't. That pass interference thing, though. Makes me very nervous, that new way they're doing pass interference reviews. Just when will that ugliness ruin us in the playoffs? I know, just getting emotionally prepared for it, sorry, call me the anti-Pollyanna, you can, I understand.

So as it is we get the ball under that five-minutes and run clock with Spencer Ware this time. He does very well actually, very nice. Feels like 2016 -- pretty neat. Here is where that steady grinding works, however. Just not close enough for it to be meaningful as far as the Reid playcalling being stellar when it is crucial.

Next week is when it gets really serious, regular season-wise. The Bills need to beat the Patriots and we need to win out -- the Bears and Chargers close out the regular season.
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Chiefs at Patriots - Week 14 - Record: 9-4

Before this game I considered the only thing that mattered was what we did in the last five minutes of the 4th quarter in a close game. Doesn't matter if we blow them out, doesn't matter if they blow us out. This is just the regular season. Both teams will merely be learning from this to prepare for when it really counts in January.

That's why all that mattered was that this was close and we ourselves practiced actually really truly doing what it took to win a close one.

So here's what happened, starting with that five minutes remaining.

5:04 to be precise. We're up 23-16. That close score we need. Patriots have the ball.

Now their first score back at the beginning of the game was on a flea flicker that we thoroughly bit on. Sure enough, they pull off another trick play, a halfback option pass they get all the way to our 30. Our defense was aggressive all day, which was actually pretty effective, but dang, keep your eyes open guys!

We get them down to a 4th-&-6, but in our aggressiveness we let Brady slip away to slog for 17 yards. Ball now inside the 20.

2:00 - Patriots still threatening. They run and lose two, 2nd-&-12. Next Brady throws an incomplete pass in the end zone, now 3rd-&-12. Edelman makes a nice catch to the 5, but it is now 4th-&-3, about a minute left.

Sure enough, we blitz, force Brady to throw it quickly. He makes a nice pass, but Bashaud Breeland makes a phenomenal play on the ball and taps it away.

Game over.

Thing is, I'm still not sold on this whole thing. I could write a lot, but here are the main things. We dominated this game in the 2nd quarter and much of the 3rd, but we still looked like we could not put the hammer down. Sorry. We also got very very lucky -- yes! The Patriots were the victims of another team's luck! Oh that that would happen in a playoff game.

On two plays the Chiefs totally lucked out when the officials just messed up calls. Don't get me wrong, there were five calls I made specific note of that the officials egregiously missed that aided the Patriots. Five of them, way too many to consider the refs were not yet again favoring the Patriots. One of them was a flagrant shove of Mahomes out-of-bounds and right into the sideline equipment that very much should have been called. Another was a pile-driving of Mahomes into the turf after a pass release that was also obvious, but again, they just chose not to call it.

But the two plays that really helped out the Chiefs? Kelce caught a first down pass, then went backwards and fumbled it away. The Patriots got the ball, but they lost the yardage they should have gotten -- I don't think the guy who recovered the fumble would've scored -- but the officials just should have not blown their whistles.

The other play was a touchdown by their receiver at the pylon, but the official on the field ruled his foot went out of bounds at the three-yard line. Well, it didn't, it should've been a touchdown. The problem was Belichick had no challenges left, so it couldn't be challenged. Whut? I'm sorry, yes, I'm arguing vehemently in favor of the opponent, in this instance, but sure enough, that kind of thing could happen to us. It has! In the absolute worst ways! How much do we all know it!

The Patriots were robbed of a touchdown they should have had because the NFL simply does not do the right thing and just get the call right. Get rid of all that coach's challenge stuff and have two officials in the booth -- I think I've said this a hundred times in this blog, but really, no one else is on board with this obvious solution? Again, have two officials in the booth with original play judging capacity. It is the simplest thing on the planet.

Just - get - the - call - correct.

Yay we won. We've got the AFC West wrapped up. We've got a winning season for the seventh straight year, all under Andy Reid, kudos to him for sure. It's nice, I know. Not dismissing this, it is indeed great. Four straight AFC West titles, excellent.

But there are so many things that still need to happen out there for us to be successful in the playoffs. Dammit we just have to do better on offense in that 4th quarter. Sorry, but the Patriots just looked sharper, better coached (what's new?), more persistent. Really though, we should've been up 37-16 in the middle of the 4th quarter. I think the reason we finally took them down is because man-for-man the Chiefs had the talent edge. The Patriots needed more from their receivers, they didn't have much of a running game, and Brady has lost a liiitle bit -- but he's still extraordinarily good.

So it is nice the Chiefs are talented, but the discipline? Oh my. Last week we had no penalties, but today we went right back to getting far too many penalties, and several really that cost us. It has gotten to the point when every time the opponent's quarterback throws the ball I'm freaking out waiting for the PI flag to be thrown.

Some of the nice things though, we'll close with that.

Tanoh Kpassagnon had another blocked kick! This one a field goal attempt. Meanwhile Butker was nails for us, making all three of his kicks. We did allow them to block a kick, but Dave Toub will make sure that gets cleaned up. Still, Colquitt got two nice booming punts late to keep the Patriots pinned back, one of them a 57-yarder.

Mahomes made his standard amazing throws. He got one to Hill to get the first down on a 3rd-&-19 -- Hill, by the way, really needs to get the ball more. When he did get the ball he made plays with his still eye-popping speed and quickness. Mahomes touchdown pass was to Hardman deep, again while he was backpedaling.

Breeland had an interception against Brady to go with his game-saving bat. Travis Kelce had a fun wildcat touchdown, employing that fun playmaking we're all hoping Reid can use to greater success in the postseason.

Again a shout-out to our defense. Spagnuolo really got them to be aggressive, blitzing a lot and, believe it or not, it did seem to rattle Brady. For all the ways we let them zip past it, it did work most of the time.

So yeah, will we now keep playing hard and still vigorously PRACTICE WINNING CLOSE GAMES even though we've wrapped up at least one home game here in January? Winning against New England is big in case they stumble some more and we can squeeze into that playoff bye spot.

It was fun watching Mahomes on the sideline just dress down the team to fire them up when they were bumbling around as the 4th quarter started. And right there was Travis Kelce with a bloodied face, right there hopefully being inspired even though it was his careless fumble that almost gave the whole thing away.

Here's to that Mahomes-led inspiration keeping us focused and, yeah, getting our clutch postseason game on full bore. We will need it.
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Raiders at Chiefs - Week 13 - Record: 8-4

"Chiefs have not lost a Sunday division game since 2014." This was the stat of the day shared by Mitch on the post-game radio show, and this is truly amazing. One of the terrific things about Andy Reid is his dominance against our division. Just an update overall: All-time we are 65-54 against the Broncos. We are 63-55 against the Chargers. And we are now 66-52 against the Raiders. That's pretty cool.

But for now? We've simply got to handle other teams out of our division. Here's one of those things with Andy Reid. Here's precisely why I just fear we're not going anywhere in the way of glory with him and his amazing playmaking ability leading the team.

In the middle of the 1st quarter we had the ball deep in Raiders territory, up 7-0, with a 3rd-&-1. Reid runs Darrel Williams into the line, no gain. On 4th-&-1 he runs Williams again into the line. No gain.

See, if this guy has all this amazing playmaking ability, what good is it if we don't use it? What good is it unless we use it to get good yardage and more points? Here we are in the middle of the 1st quarter ready to put the Raiders away, and we get vanilla with the game calling.

How about this? How about our head coach, no matter the score or situation, just runs the plays? How about putting confidence in the best quarterback in the NFL and on that 4th-&-1 do some play action, roll out Mahomes, and have him pass it to Kelce for the 1st down?

Why is Andy Reid so scared?

Remember, even though we pounded the Raiders today, what will happen when we are in that close game? A nice pasting of the Raiders is fun, but we really need those critical games when Andy has absolutely got to adjust his playmaking to be better than the opponent late in a very close playoff game.

Yes! I am Monday Morning Quarterbacking, I am! I confess! And it's not even Monday! Aagh I'm sorry! But we are all so good at it! We do it for most all of January just about every year!

As for the bulk of this one, the weather was poor today, and we just played a Raiders team that was woefully overmatched. Ngck. Don't get me wrong. I'm really pleased with this. We're now in total control of the AFC West at 8-4. Maybe it'll be good we're playing New England next week so we can tough out a reeeally close game and we can -- ngcknghghnkck -- you know it --------

Practice winning a close game that will result in winning a playoff game that we actually do win because we truly fully actually 

TOOK CARE OF BUSINESS.

Some really good things about today's game, just to put 'em down.

Tyreek Hill did his job again. Routes, catches, acceleration. Awesome in only a few catches. I also like Sammy Watkins still drawing lots of attention. Don't get down on him. Watkins' play makes things wide open for Hill and Kelce.

One of those particularly nice Mahomes throws to Hill was a dime that helped lead to our first TD. He also threw an amazing pass to Kelce, while backpedaling, perfect for Kelce to jump up and nicely snatch it right at the 1st down marker.

When we were up 31-3 in the 4th quarter, we decided to let rookie Darwin Thompson run the ball, get him experience, chew clock. He really responded by essentially single-handedly matriculating the ball all the way down the field capped by a rushing touchdown.

Our defense was solid today, frustrating Derek Carr making his day at Arrowhead yet again just miserable. The highlight was the play of another rookie, Juan Thornhill, who had a terrific stop on a Raiders 4th down, and just a bit later read a slant pass play like a book and picked it taking it to the house.

Harrison Butker, on a blustery day, banged through a 50-yard field goal. Speaking of special teams, at the very end of the game we got a blocked PAT returned for two points, neat. But yeah. Can we get one of those to win an incredible playoff game, if we need some crazy wonderful play like that to win then? Can we?

And our discipline across the board was very strong, no penalties! Can you believe it! None, zero! That's major. This is only the third time in all of Chiefs history when they've had a game with no penalties at all. (I should note they had a penalty but the Raiders had one on the same play so they were offsetting.) The Raiders were abysmal with the penalties, 12 all together and most were big. They even got hit with a PI that had to be reviewed in New York, an INT that was reversed and followed by a Chiefs touchdown shortly afterwards.

On to the game of the year against the Patriots!
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