Time for the Chiefs to put up or shut up

If the Kansas City Chiefs are legitimate Super Bowl contenders, it’s time for them to start playing with the consistency of one.

The Kansas City Chiefs should be kicking themselves heading into Week 11.

How did they manage to waste a 400-yard game from Patrick Mahomes and lose to the Tennessee Titans? Andy Reid’s team allowed nearly 200 rushing yards to Derrick Henry, a game-winning touchdown drive from Ryan Tannehill when they had the game won, and a total of 35 points to the NFL’s 22nd-ranked offense.

When Mahomes was out with a dislocated knee, the Chiefs looked like a team slowly starting to figure things out. They nearly beat Aaron Rodgers with Matt Moore at quarterback, and then beat the Minnesota Vikings with Moore at quarterback while handling the NFL’s leading rusher in Dalvin Cook and the NFL’s passer rating leader in Kirk Cousins.

Where was the resilient Chiefs defense that embarrassed the Denver Broncos on Thursday Night Football? Instead, the Chiefs regressed to their old habits earlier this season, offering up wide swaths of the middle of the field to either Tannehill or Henry without making any plays of their own.

And therein lies the problem for the Chiefs. As brilliant as Mahomes is at creating plays from nothing in an offense containing Tyreek Hill, Travis Kelce, and too many more weapons to list, the defense cannot get the ball back in his hands.

Coming into the season, the Chiefs defense always looked like it’d be a liability in comparison to the offense. However, the Chiefs were supposed to be better after making multiple upgrades to the secondary and revamping the pass rush, though the moves made to the front seven look questionable in hindsight, especially with Dee Ford thriving in San Francisco.

Still, the Chiefs seemed to have at least two players who could manufacture big plays for the defense: rookie safety Juan Thornhill and experienced safety Tyrann Mathieu. As the Pittsburgh Steelers acquisition of Minkah Fitzpatrick has shown the NFL world, one playmaking safety can make all the difference. And Kansas City seemed to have two such players on their hands.

Yet after recording multiple turnovers in four of their first six games, the Chiefs have forced only two turnovers in their last four. Frank Clark and Charvarius Ward have forced three turnovers each, but the Chiefs are 21st in total turnovers forced and thus unsurprisingly 22nd in yards allowed overall.

The Chiefs offense is one of the top five units in the NFL and rank second in the league in passing yards per attempt. Mahomes has thrown 18 touchdowns, one interception, nine yards per attempt, and 328 yards per game. Basically, he’s been as insane as he was last season.

However, the Chiefs are 6-4. They are 0.5 games ahead of the Mason Rudolph-led Steelers. Rudolph is averaging a whole 2.4 yards per attempt less than Mahomes this season.

This discrepancy speaks volumes to how much improvement the Chiefs defense must make going forward, and it all starts with the turnovers. They are not going to magically get better at stopping the run; they rank second-to-last with an abysmal 5.1 yards per carry allowed. Plus, trying to emphasize their weaknesses against the run could make the linebackers even more vulnerable in the passing game, which would be a worse outcome for overall defensive efficiency.

So the solution for the Chiefs is coaching changes that focus on defensive aggression. Gamble on more plays, get the ball in Mahomes’ hands, and trust that he can make up the difference. The Chiefs have lost just one game this season in which they forced multiple turnovers; this was a one-touchdown loss to the Houston Texans in which Mahomes completed a season-low 54% of his passes.

The Chiefs have the potential to be the best team in the AFC, because their offense is indeed elite with a once-in-a-generation talent at quarterback in Mahomes. But if they keep suffering defensive meltdowns, Mahomes’ supporting cast on defense will once again hold the entire team back, even as his supporting cast on offense has remained one of the NFL’s best.

Mahomes and Reid can carry the Chiefs past plenty of problems, but in a deeper AFC which features two other MVP candidates at quarterback in Lamar Jackson and Deshaun Watson – as well as the always-dangerous Patriots – no glaring weaknesses can exist.

If the Chiefs and their defense can’t get it together in Week 11 agains the rival Los Angeles Chargers, it may be time to seriously doubt them, at 6-5, as a legitimate Super Bowl contender. These are the games they have to win, and they have to win with conviction.

Because the end goal is a Super Bowl ring. Nothing less will register as a success for this ambitious organization.

And if they fail to make the Super Bowl again this year, it’ll be an instance of the same issues on defense undermining a strong season from Mahomes and the offense.