Are the Chiefs contenders or pretenders this season?

Sitting at the bottom of the AFC West, the Chiefs are coming off an electric Week 6 win. Yet the question remains: are they contenders or pretenders?

Chiefs Kingdom has been wrought with anxiety this season. For the first time ever, the Chiefs are not leagues ahead of their AFC West counterparts.

In fact, they’re dead last in their division.

Reasons abound as to why this is the case — many have pointed blame towards the defense, the stagnant rushing game, the sloppy turnovers, or the uncharacteristic drops. There are whispers that Patrick Mahomes’ reckless tendencies, which date back to his college days, are finally catching up to him — a controversial belief that has left much of the Kansas City faithful furious.

In reality, it’s a bit of all of these things, and together, it puts the Chiefs in a very difficult position to win a playoff spot come years’ end.

Chiefs are still more pretender than contender, even with Patrick Mahomes

It seems unfathomable that the league’s most dazzling quarterback still finds himself struggling, but that truly is the reality in Arrowhead. The same problems that plagued Mahomes in Super Bowl LV are still present in 2021.

Athletic plays like this make some believe that Mahomes is the best quarterback in the NFL, but the out-of-pocket theatrics are unsustainable for the league’s best passers.

While Mahomes certainly has his own brand of magic when it comes to playmaking, part of the problem is that he relies too much on it. Most of Mahomes’ plays consist of him running out of the pocket and throwing to a receiver that gets open on a broken route.

Mahomes admitted that he was still learning how to read defenses halfway through 2019, which should be untenable for an NFL quarterback. But Mahomes is incredible at ripping out of the pocket and still connecting with receivers. There are still pitfalls to learning on the fly and playing in that manner, however.

That is especially true when considering the Chiefs defense, a unit that ranks dead last in the NFL in opponents’ yards per play this season and has been under even more criticism with Mahomes.

Until Mahomes reins it in even slightly — though not robbing himself of what makes him special — and the Chiefs find some sort of reinforcements to help on defense, Kansas City will continue to be mired far below their expectations coming into the season.