KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Even under the glare of Monday Night Football, even up against a team they still love to hate in this Vegas version, even after being doused in cold water two weeks ago in Indianapolis, the Chiefs inexplicably showed up sleepwalking on Monday night at Arrowhead Stadium.
Maybe somewhere inside they figured they could fall back on Andy Reid’s 15-3 record against the Raiders since he arrived in Kansas City. Maybe they just didn’t take them seriously enough with their 1-3 record or after clobbering them 41-14 and 48-9 last season. And perhaps having Buffalo coming up next didn’t help, either.
Whatever the case …
“They brought the fight to us … I thought they just were more physical than we were …,” quarterback Patrick Mahomes said. “They came out, they rushed the passer well, they ran the ball well. Those two things are how physical you are.”
So next thing you know, the Raiders are up 17-0. In a muted Arrowhead, the listless Chiefs were going nowhere.
At least not without some extraordinary sparks, including a furious display by normally subdued coach Andy Reid, that flipped the script into an exhilarating 30-29 victory.
A victory we figure was more reassuring than distressing but nonetheless open to interpretation.
Through one lens, it begs the question of how and why they weren’t lasered in from the get-go and what that means going forward.
Through another, the one that’s more clear here, it says this is the mortar that helps make something special.
“All it did was just, you know, almost build the beast,” said Travis Kelce, who was a beast in himself as he matched the NFL record for touchdown receptions by a tight end in a game with four.
It also gave testimony to a certain resilience for the Chiefs (4-1).
Both in the comeback itself and in fending off Las Vegas in the end … with a little help from a slapstick collision between Raiders receivers on their last offensive play on the way to another tight AFC West victory.
“You see what it takes: It takes everything out of you, down to the last second. …,” rookie defensive end George Karlaftis said. “These are the type of games you live for.”
They’re also the type of games that can deplete you with lasting impact if you can’t generate something to get traction and create momentum.
Which the Chiefs found, little by little.
Like when Jerick McKinnon broke a 30-yard run to set up their first touchdown. Or when Mahomes challenged the offensive line (“We’re going to win or lose this game because of y’all,” he said) and chirped with Raiders players (mostly Maxx Crosby).
“Sometimes you have to create your own energy,” Mahomes said, “and I kind of did that.”
But the twist of the night was that nothing reset the game like what ostensibly was the low point for the Chiefs: the jaw-dropping roughing the passer call on Chris Jones, who had knocked the ball loose from Derek Carr and recovered it only to be penalized for landing on him.
Afterwards, Jones wondered aloud what he was supposed to have done. While making it a point to say “not saying the ref was wrong,” he joked, “This is a Christian-like league; I’m going to pray that I stay off the quarterback, OK? I’m going to have to pick him up and carry him and lay him down nowadays.”
The call offset what would have been a Chiefs possession near midfield late in the second quarter, enabling the Raiders to drive for a field goal to make it 20-7 with 17 seconds left in the half.
After the call, Reid spent the rest of the half, and the first moments of halftime, fuming and stalking the sideline and finally getting an audience with referee Carl Cheffers.
“I got it off my chest, and he got it off his chest,” Reid said. “He made the call he made, and I got what I needed said.”
In more ways than one.
Because that was a statement in itself to the team.
“Once Big Red gets fired up,” Kelce said, “we’re rolling.”
Call it coincidence, but the game essentially turned from there. And not just because the next seven penalties went against the Raiders.
“I think it gave us a little juice, probably,” Reid said with considerable understatement.
With the crowd suddenly raging (“Arrowhead had our backs,” as Kelce put it), the Chiefs made that 17 seconds count when kicker Matthew Wright boomed a franchise-record 59-yard field goal on the last play of the half to cut it to 20-10.
Then the Chiefs launched long touchdown drives on their first three drives of the second half — the third of which was enabled by a Las Vegas holding penalty that gave the Chiefs an automatic first down even as Wright was missing a 37-yard field goal on fourth and 14 at the Raiders 18-yard line.
The Raiders didn’t wilt, though, making it 30-29 on a 48-yard pass from Derek Carr to Davante Adams with 4:27 left but failing on a 2-point conversion attempt.
They threatened again after they got the ball back with 2:29 to go, but Carr’s fourth-and-1 pass from the Las Vegas 46 landed harmlessly after Adams and Hunter Renfrow collided.
Not quite like it was drawn up.
Just like the victory itself for the Chiefs.
“By any means necessary …,” Karlaftis said. “It’s not who starts. It’s who finishes.”
He meant that in the context of the game. But it’s just as applicable to the arc of the season.
“As the course of the season goes on,” safety Justin Reid said, “you just have to keep moving in an uphill direction.”
We’ll know better in hindsight whether this game stands more for vulnerability or strength.
But what Mahomes said he told some teammates after the game resonates: “‘Sometimes these games (are) the ones that build the true character of the team.’”
With another revealing test coming Sunday against the Bills.
