Ten Things About Last Night's Game Week 13: KC 22 - Donks 16

[gblowfish]

Ten Things About Last Night’s Game Week 13: KC 22 Donks 16

10. I wanted to sleep on this one before putting down my thoughts because I went to bed with a very odd feeling. I can’t remember the last time I got less enjoyment from a Chiefs win. I thought I’d toss and turn all night, but actually I slept pretty well and hopefully now that its the day after, will be calm and rational in my observations. I think there were three reasons I was so pissed off following the game. First, it seemed like this was another example of the Chiefs playing to their level of competition. Second, it was one of those games where every momentum call seemed to break Denver’s way. Third, these are the Donks. And if there’s a team that needs to be destroyed, it’s the Donks.

9. Cases in point - Playing to the level of the competition: The Donks are so stupid in Covid World that they allowed ALL of their QBs to get put into protocol, and had to start a practice squad receiver at QB last week vs. the Saints. On the other hand, they’re not as bad as their record might appear. Two of their four wins are against New England and Miami, both potential playoff teams. Donk defense gave the Chiefs all they wanted in both games. Chiefs had zero third down conversions in the first matchup in Denver and were only 3 for 10 on third down last night. KC was zip for four in the red zone on TDs; Donks 2 for 2. So the Donk Defense is legit. I’ll get to the “momentum” calls down the list. Finally, these are the Donks. John Elway’s fat ugly drooling horse face is up in our press box spitting in a cup. I didn’t think emotional support animals were allowed on the plane. At halftime, I was popping antacid thinking about the very real possibility that we could lose to both the Faid and the Donks at home this season. That really made me angry, and for awhile looked like we might get more of the same in the second half.

8. I'm still so pissed, there IS no number 8...

7. On momentun plays: Yeah, Tyreek caught a TD and didn’t even realize it. When he was tackled the ball popped up, and landed on his arm. He didn’t realize it had never touched the ground. When he came off the field he told the coaches he didn’t catch it. Whoever is the challenge coach in the booth screwed up. They ran the punt team out and kicked away a TD before NBC could even show a replay of the catch. So Andy gave away a TD. Not only that, Denver gets the punt, and on the subsequent series gets a 65 yard run right up the middle to Gordon. Then Breeland gets beat for a Donk TD, 14 point flip right there. Fourth Quarter, Watkins makes a first down catch to get KC down to the Donk 30. Refs overturn the catch. A few plays later, Mahomes hits Hill to beat a blitz, he back flips into the end zone. Ref’s flag Alegretti for a mystery holding call -Tyreek’s SECOND TD taken away. Donks were only called for three penalties all night, and none of them were holding or hands to the face on the O-Line. Chris Jones was being raped all night, and not a single call. Again this week, Chiefs have ZERO sacks. ZERO. The lack of calls against the Donk line again plays to game momentum. Denver's line was literally allowed to hold the entire game.

6. Last year around this time, Spag’s defense began to solidify and was just good enough. In the playoffs into the Super Bowl they gave up big leads, but Mahomes was able to overcome them all, and the defense got stops when they needed in the fourth quarter. I never had a secure feeling that the defense would stop Denver the entire game. On the front, Jones played well despite being double teamed and held on multiple passing downs. On the TV broadcast it said Frank Clark was rated 99th out of 106 players at his position. Just a reminder that we’re paying this guy almost $21 million a year to be the 99th best defensive end out of 106. Last night he had two tackles and zero sacks. Breeland got beat for both Donk TD’s and threw in a DPI penalty to boot. Ward had a DPI. Thornhill and Sneed were missing tackles. Dirty Dan played a decent game. Honey Badger was the only D-back to show up with both picks. We can’t get rid of Neiman soon enough. Gordon’s 65 yard run was right at his gap and he totally whiffed on plugging the hole. Linebacker must be a priority for this team next year. Despite all this ugliness, Spags only gave up six points in the second half, including pitching a shutout in the fourth quarter. So even though KC is dead last in NFL red zone defense, Spags ultimately got the job done. Just enough D to hold on like the last couple games vs. Tampa and Carolina.

5. Sometimes I wonder why coaches pull off of the hot hand? A couple of examples: Mahomes between the 20’s was unstoppable. Then when the Chiefs get in first and goal, they take the ball out of his hands and start running gadget plays, like semi-wildcat stuff or reverses. You have one of the best blocking fullbacks in football with Sherman. Line up in the I formation, put Mahomes under center. POUND the freakin’ rock behind Fisher or behind Allegretti with Williams, and do it three times in a row if need be. And since Mahomes got hurt on that freak knee injury in Denver last year, they haven’t allowed him to sneak ONCE. In the game’s final five minutes, they put Williams in and he ran hard. He’s a big bruising back, hard to bring down. They gave him the ball six times in that final five minutes, and he averaged over six yards a carry. Watkins had two catches for first downs. The good news is, they were able to burn up three minutes of game time and made the Donks use their remaining two time outs. Bad news is, for whatever reason, they put Bell back in the game, he loses yards. KC ends up in a 3rd and 12, can’t convert, and Buttkicker ends up having to hit the 48 yard field goal -which was pushed back from 43 yards by a BS delay of game penalty by the refs. Why go away from Williams and Watkins? I guess the Donks made the same mistake with their running game. We had no answer for Gordon. He ran for 131 yards. Chiefs were killing Lindsey. He got the ball almost as many times as Gordon and averaged less than 2 yards per carry. If the Donks give those extra 15 carries to Gordon, they probably win the game.

4. Buttkicker gets a game ball for this one. Five for Five, including hitting a crucial 48 yarder with two minutes left to push the lead to six points. He didn’t let the “delay of game” fiasco phase him. McManus the Donk kicker is having an All-Pro year. Donks pushed him too far last night. He hits a 53 yarder, then they force him to try a 57-yarder and he misses wide left. He had hit 21 in a row before that. Not only did he miss, but the field position and 28 seconds gave Mahomes enough time to get Buttkicker in position to hit a last second field goal to cut the halftime lead to one point. KC got the ball first in the second half and drove down for another field goal, taking the lead at 12-10. That was the biggest momentum swing in the entire game.

3. Mahomes gets another 300 yard passing game, another TD pass to keep his streak alive, and in the fourth quarter came up with another couple scrambles for first downs. Hope that made Horseface choke on his dip. He was only sacked once. Patrick is maturing each week and is smart with the ball. He seems to know when to get rid of it, when to run and when to get out of bounds. Kelce got eight catches for 136 and the only TD, and this is his fifth year in a row with over 1000 yards receiving. I think he needs around 263 more yards to set the season receiving record for a tight end. He must have taken a few shots in the game, because for some unknown reason, he thought he was playing the Raiders…

https://sports.yahoo.com/travis-kelc...044339709.html

2. Donks led the NFL in turnovers coming into this game with 26. Lock’s two picks were one of the major differences in the game’s outcome. You cannot waste drives against the Chiefs. The old uncomfortable mantra “Three’s don’t beat Sevens” kept playing in my head for most of the game. The one TD that the refs let us keep was the difference. It all goes back to finding any way to win necessary. Gamblers probably took a bath on this one. Wasn’t the spread 14 points? If you took Denver and the points and bet the under, you probably made real good bank.

1. So saving the best for last and trying to tie it all together with a big bow: Even though I squirmed through this entire game, it was an important win over a division foe, and best of all, clinched a playoff spot. The Faid had to chuck up a bomb with 13 seconds left to squeak by an 0-11 Jets team -who may have tanked that play to keep their stronghold on the Trevor Lawrence sweepstakes. We’ve been so spoiled over the past few years with Andy; now making the playoffs is a ho-hum given. The days of Pioli and Haley and Tyler Palko were not that long ago. Chiefs are in the playoffs with four games left to go; 11-1, 91% winning percentage. That’s a major accomplishment, especially in this unpredictable year of Covid. Two potentially difficult road games are up next. Last year Chiefs fans wanted to give a Super Bowl ring to Ryan Fitzpatrick for taking out the Pats. Not sure if we’ll get Fitz or Tua at QB. Fish defense allows about as many yards a game as our defense does. So we return to the scene of last year’s Super Bowl, and hopefully can get some mojo from that and keep on Pittsburgh’s six.

[OrtonsPiercedTaint]

The AFC West is family. No one can play you like family

[FloridaMan88]

Even though the Faketriots won the AFC East 10+ seasons, they still had close battles with their divisional rivals (even when those teams weren't very good). Multiple shitty Dolphins teams beat them over the years.

Those other divisional teams tried to build their rosters with the primary focus on beating the Faketriots and it was their Super Bowl every time they played New England.

The same situation now applies to the Chiefs and the AFC West.

[jerryaldini]

11th thing

[MMXcalibur]

Awesome read, George.

Totally agree on the defense. At the end of the day, yes, they only gave up 16 points....but man, was it a nerve-wracking defensive display. I never felt like they had a grasp on stopping Denver's running game and their bootleg passes (Jake Plummer, is that you?)

[Renegade]

Great read GB. What happened to #8? What

[gblowfish]

Originally Posted by Renegade

Great read GB. What happened to #8? What

Like Kelce, I'm confused...

[mililo4cpa]

Great write up as always....

As a guy who played a lot of football growing up, including at a small college level, I think sometimes things have to be taken into perspective, especially since we're not talking high school or college level....we're talking NFL, where the margin of good to great is very small...

First: Defense: I too didn't feel much confidence in getting a stop, but the reality is that the Donks only scored 16 points....for our Chiefs, that's going to win 99 out of a 100 times, and I may be conservative with that estimate.

Second: Red Zone: Yeah, it was ugly, but I do think that the Chiefs have dedicated plays that they hold to for only the most needed of times, and last night's scenarios never really got to that critical mass point. Could it have cost them....maybe? but I'd guess that if they absolutely thought they needed a TD at that time, they would have dialed up some plays

Finally: There is no team in the NFL that doesn't think they need to play better the next game than they did the last. The Chiefs could have won by 30 points, and we'd be hearing about how we need to get better. I think, in reality, any win is a good win, regardless of how we fans think it should go....Of course, I'd love a three score victory every week, but that's just not reality in the NFL. I don't think the Chiefs look at it as "playing down" to opposition, I think they look at it as "we just won a hard fought game, now, let's get better for next time..." the Donks, for all their flaws, have played pretty good to (at times) great defense, so it's no small feat to beat a team that (by the way) is pretty ticked off at losing the prior 10 in a row to you as well, and would love nothing better than to bump you off

So, we absolutely have some items to address, but a win is a win in the NFL, and while it wasn't impressive to our eyes, it sure as hell is better than being the "upset of the day" story that many teams would have become in the same situation....

[PHOG]

Thanks for the write-up gb. I think we were holding quite a few of our offensive arsenal close to the vest. While I want us to annihilate the Donkos as much as the next guy, you could almost feel all the other playofff teams' coaches watching, trying get ANY useful info to try to stop us.

On to Miami and the fish.

[IowaHawkeyeChief]

Good read George...Thanks again.

A couple of points... As much as I hate horseface, it appeared he was spittinig sunflower seeds.

Also, I don't see the hate for Niemann, he's and undersized free agent linebacker that is needed on every team with the salary cap. He should not be getting significant playing time, but he is a good ST player that you need on the team. I agree we should increase the talent there so he is not the starter or getting 50% of the snaps, but he is an valuable in ST and you need those low cost guys.

[vonBobo]

Very exciting game! If this was Marty's team we would be shitting ourselves over the come from behind win!
Both teams stayed focused and made plays when they needed to.
The deciding factor was Lock's inability to make a play under pressure. If the chiefs could have gotten up early and forced Denver into more passing situations this could have been the blowout everyone was expecting.

[MahomesMagic]

Our inability to score TD's allowed the Donkeys to protect Lock more and stay balanced. Take the win and move on. I do think Mahomes wants the MVP and was annoyed but he also cares more about the ultimate goal.

[SeattleChiefFan]

The one TD that the refs let us keep was the difference.

[Bwana]

Great read! It would seem we were having a lot of the same concerns during the game and it did have an ugly feel to it. Thankfully, we pulled it off.

[gblowfish]

BTW: A year ago today I was sitting in Boston's Logan Airport waiting for the rain on the East Coast to subside and let Mrs B and me get back home. Flight was delayed five hours. The day before I got to see KC beat the Pats in their crib. I was there with Twisted Chief and Clay. I think that's the weekend that really started things in motion to win the Super Bowl. Hard to believe it's been a year already.