But ::whew:: Noah Gray is there to recover to seal this one. Oh my.
Into the game progression:
We were moving the ball with our first drive but a sweep run by Hardman on 3rd-&-short was snuffed. This was just one of a few really questionable vanilla play calls by Reid. The Chargers defense was looking good tonight, however, you've got to give them credit.
Our pass rush really needs to step up. Herbert got very little real pressure early tonight. Our poor D-line or their much improved O-line?
I don't know why the Chargers didn't throw to Mike Williams on every play. The Chiefs tried Rashad Fenton and he was miserable, just because he's just not got the physicality to guard the guy. We then went with Jaylen Watson who's got a bit more size but is still very inexperienced. Then we went with probably our best cover guy, L'Jarius Sneed, and he was victimized by an amazing Williams TD catch.
In the middle of the first half I was hoping Reid would put in McKinnon and Pacheco to make things happen in the running game. They did and it made a difference. A bit later CEH went back in and did nothing. I still have hope for CEH but I'm beginning to doubt he can really handle the quickness and strength of an NFL defense. One time later he did make a super nice play on a catch bouncing off guys, however.
The Chiefs first-half touchdown was one of the best MAHOMES THE GREAT MAGICIAN performances ever. We're in the red zone, he's back to pass, then starts to scramble right. He jukes and jives and jukes some more, totally escaping the grasp of a very close tackler when he threads the needle to McKinnon for the score. Can we say Whah-ow! too many times? His second TD was an absolute strike to Justin Watson -- more and more and more Whah-ows...
Mecole Hardman made some pretty good plays, and I can't not give him some cred here because yet again the Arrowhead Pride guys still can't stop hating on him. He got injured and struggled a bit after that, still working hard to be in there and play well.
Towards the end of the first half the Chiefs had the ball with a couple minutes left, plenty of time for Mahomes to matriculate the ball down the field for at least a game-tying field goal. Joey Bosa rams into Mahomes legs causing him to get up gimpy putting a fright into all of us. Flag on the play. Definitely roughing the passer.
The ref calls the penalty on us. "The tackle dragged Bosa into Mahomes." Holding. That was their call.
Then we all got to see the replay.
Indeed, it was an absolutely horrific call. Andrew Wiley barely grabbed Bosa's jersey and in no way did Wiley's action pull Bosa into Mahomes. It was all Bosa. When the Arrowhead fans saw that replay they loudly expressed their displeasure. Not only did that keep us from a chance to get points, but way worse is he almost crippled our QB.
Our offense was just not up to the physicality of a team like the Chargers. The Chiefs did pick up as the game wore on, but the word is the Chargers went out and updated their defense in a big way, and our offense was just getting manhandled by their guys. Our extraordinary 3rd down proficiency last week against the Cardinals was nowhere to be seen tonight.
As far as our defensive guys go, good thing we've got Nick Bolton in there. He's a stud and he's only going to get better. That's a nice Chiefs thing for sure. There was an amazing pass rush sequence for our boys that utterly smothered Herbert, leading to a punt from the back of their end zone and terrific field position at their 35. Must add that we found out a bit later that two of the Chargers starting O-linemen suffered injuries.
As the 4th quarter started rookie Bryan Cook got a really stupid unsportsmanlike -- erggck -- rookie stupidness. He's going to be a good player, but he's got to learn. How about this switcharoo, though. Right after the Chargers marched down the field to within a couple yards of a TD, another of our rookies, the aforementioned Jaylen Watson, picks Herbert right at the goal line and houses it. Oh yeah.
As the game wore on Herbert seemed to wear down. He was getting hammered in the backfield and that may have been because of their weakened O-line. Herbert almost threw a pick when trying to squeeze the ball into Williams, and after the Chiefs got the ball back CEH got the handoff, got facemasked (they called it), and rambled deep into Chargers territory to get us the field goal putting us up 27-17 with about three minutes left.
Justin Herbert is a gamer even though he's still growing, learning. As mentioned he'd gotten roughed up and it looked like he was seriously injured, but on 4th down with the game on the line he threw a bullet to get his team to the five and then a couple plays later, I believe it was 4th down then too, he threw a touchdown pass to make the score 27-24.
A difficult game to watch for the Chiefs early, but they made adjustments, played a little better later, made it an exciting win with the help of a stupendous break when Herbert threw that pick-six.
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The image is from Chris Donahue at the official Chiefs site. Thank you.
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