In the last half-decade, the Kansas City Chiefs have been the NFL’s gold standard.
No one has won more regular-season games. No one has won and or appeared in more Super Bowls. No one has appeared more unbeatable in clutch moments, especially with their backs against the wall. The competition simply can’t compare to the peak success of the Patrick Mahomes, Andy Reid, and Travis Kelce era. The Chiefs have set the pace for everyone else. At every turn, they’ve lapped the field.
Unfortunately for Kansas City, the Chiefs couldn’t maintain this blistering pace forever.
Saturday night featured another Chiefs playoff victory, this time over an uninspiring Miami Dolphins squad. Kansas City will now play in the Divisional Round for the sixth straight season. Should the Chiefs win next weekend, they will extend their streak of AFC title game appearances to six, sitting only behind the Tom Brady-Bill Belichick New England Patriots (eight). Ah, but there’s the rub. Because such a possibility — continued Chiefs postseason success this year, that is — has never felt more unrealistic.
FINAL: The @Chiefs get a #SuperWildCard win in the cold! #NFLPlayoffs #MIAvsKC pic.twitter.com/s3AErcJCZV
— NFL (@NFL) January 14, 2024
The Chiefs themselves aren’t in a position to quibble about a 19-point win in January. After their rampant inconsistencies this year, Saturday night was likely the most complete game Kansas City had played in weeks.
But I’m not moved by any perceived dominance over a team from South Florida playing in beyond-frigid conditions. I’m not impressed by a win over an injury-battered squad missing several key starters on both sides of the ball, including starting pass rushers Bradley Chubb and Jaelan Phillips, star safety Jevon Holland, and starting guard Connor Williams. I’m not moved by shutting down Tua Tagovailoa, a quarterback who has demonstrated he doesn’t possess the aptitude necessary to overcome physical defensive play from quality opponents.
To say the Dolphins were an unmitigated pretender would be akin to saying “water is wet.” The Chiefs outgained the Dolphins by almost 150 yards and held them to a single third-down conversion. It’s hard to debate those results at face value. But I’d argue that was much more a circumstance of a favorable matchup with a top-heavy team that almost literally limped into the postseason. This wasn’t classic Chiefs football.
This was a fortuitous first-round draw:
The Dolphins were missing 5 starters on one side of the ball tonight against the Chiefs.
A casual observer could be forgiven for not being able to tell which side.
— Marcel Louis-Jacques (@Marcel_LJ) January 14, 2024
Nothing we saw from the Chiefs on Saturday night was a contrast from their up-and-down play during the second half of the regular season. The offense still struggled to generate big plays, averaging just 5.5 yards per play while Mahomes’ average yards per pass attempt was 6.4. The offense still struggled in the red zone, achieving a middling 33 percent conversion rate that won’t inspire an ounce of fear in any of the AFC’s heavyweights. If Rashee Rice doesn’t come prepared with a monster yards-after-the-catch performance, it’s hard to envision Kansas City scoring more than 20 points. And it’s hard to see this cautious version of Mahomes overcoming his supporting cast’s limitations. We’ve been talking about these same Chiefs’ red flags since November. They look like the same exact team.
If the Chiefs’ offense is somehow at its “best” when it turtles and settles for dump-offs, then they can’t be trusted.
Missing their top three edge rushers, the Dolphins used cover 0 on 18 dropbacks, tied for the 2nd-most in a game since 2018.
Patrick Mahomes (Wild Card vs MIA)
🔹 vs Cover 0: 7/18, 74 yds (-6.2 EPA)
🔹 Other Coverages: 16/23, 188 yds, TD (+19.1 EPA)Powered by @awscloud pic.twitter.com/YwGheR80HB
— Next Gen Stats (@NextGenStats) January 14, 2024
Kansas City can rest some of its laurels on a special defense that flew around all over the field against Miami. From Chris Jones to Nick Bolton and L’Jarius Sneed, there are field-tilters at every level of this unit. This defense can change and win a game on its own if given the opportunity. But the same could be said for the Baltimore Ravens and the rival Buffalo Bills. The Chiefs were more intimidating when they had the ultimate trump card — a high-flying offense led by Mahomes. That is no longer the case. If all of these strikes against another Chiefs’ deep playoff run weren’t enough, should the AFC field shake out as expected, the Chiefs would likely have to go on the road to beat both the Bills and Ravens just to make a return trip to the Super Bowl.
Such is life when you no longer have that advantageous Kansas City home field.
There is a fraught danger in counting out perhaps the most talented quarterback ever to play (Mahomes), maybe the finest offensive coach ever (Reid), and a future First-Ballot Hall of Fame tight end (Kelce). If any team can play beyond its means, it is this iteration of Kansas City. All bets should be off until the Chiefs are officially sent to the golf course. More supremacy from the NFL’s Big Red Machine this winter wouldn’t be surprising.
Yet, there’s a key distinction between these Chiefs and the ones that qualified for three of the last four Super Bowls. Those editions of Kansas City were flawed, too. Some couldn’t play a lick of defense. Some didn’t have a legitimate No. 1 receiver. Some were too injured in their own right. But these were never issues stacked on top of each other, further compounding their problems. By contrast, these Chiefs have a laundry list of issues to overcome. They are constructed like a fragile house of cards, asking their superhero quarterback to transcend a delicate situation that demands absolute perfection. Even Mahomes isn’t capable of such absurd wizardry.
Come to think of it: who could be?
The lower-power Chiefs should be commended for advancing to the NFL’s quarterfinals once again. Their play on Saturday night — even in a win — might be a sign that there may not be much more to celebrate about this season.
