Similar to the first two matches of the Kansas City Chiefs’ season, they made hard work of their 22-17 victory against the Atlanta Falcons who turned out to be a strong opponent, which was more competitive than we could have thought.
On both instances, it looked as if Kansas City had left a few points in the field that could have increased its margin of victory – only for the defense later in the game to find a way to smother their enemy.
Here’s a few of the star performers from Sunday night’s game, as the Chiefs improved to 3-0 at Mercedes-Benz Stadium.
The 7 Winners
Linebacker Nick Bolton: The Kansas City Chiefs’ MIKE linebacker erased every worry of what was to come as he put a definitive end to the Falcons’ comeback with a memorable tackle for loss on fourth down. Bolton was back to his old form, as he managed to mop up eight total tackles, including three tackles for loss.
Running back Carson Steele: The most significant storyline around 1 Arrowhead Drive this past week was the injury-causing trade of Isiah Pacheco − and how and who would fill the position. Steele stepped up, outgaining both of the Falcons’ well-regarded backs combined. Steele registered 74 total yards, showing good ball security and strength on short-yardage carries. He’s proved he deserves a longer stay — even when the position has more bodies to play with.
Wide receiver Rashee Rice: Since we already assumed that this year’s season would involve a lot of throwing the ball deep, we thought it would be a good year for the SMU alumnus wide receiver, as he’d also get chances to catch the ball underneath. But in three games, Rice is surpassing every single one of them. He is at the first position of all NFL wide receivers in terms of Receptions and Yards After Catch and is occupying the second position following every receiver in Yardage. He made a diving catch to gain a first down in the first quarter on Sunday and that was only one of the seven first downs he converted. He would go on to have 12 receptions off 14 targets for 110 yards and a touchdown. Those are numbers we’d expect from a No. 1 wide receiver.
Kicking specialist Matt Araiza: His three punts had an average of 48 yards, which was decent. But the remarkable high snap he caught and transformed a would bitterly ended game into a game altering moment. He is surely utilising his second chance in the league well.
Inside linebacker Leo Chenal: You won’t see much in the box score but the former Wisconsin Badger was caged on Kansas City’s game-sealing play. This was thanks to an impressive showing by the Chiefs’ Kevin Kwan Chenal who was stood up in a double team on the Chiefs’ defensive line, who single-handedly cut right through the men protecting the quarterback for the Falcons’ offensive line and making the play impossible even before Bolton reached the backside of the O-Line. This is great for Chenal because he is playing inside and full back, and both proved to be effective (and head and shoulders better than) in all of them.
Wideout Juju Smith Schuster: Kansas City didn’t bring him back to put up huge numbers – but over the last couple of weeks, he has done exactly what ‘they’ brought ‘him’ here to do: have done all the dirty work of a wide receiver of the Chiefs (including going out to block downfield) to win the game. On Sunday, Smith-Schuster received a 13-yard touchdown pass for his efforts.
Left tackle Wanya Morris: More starting opportunities seem to be on the horizon for the 2nd year player. He stood his ground beautifully against the talented falcons’ defense. The quarterback Patrick Mahomes was not under any duress from the defense hence no quarterback sacks – and the running game was efficient as well. Most importantly, all that was accomplished by Morris without incurring any penalties. A deeper dive into Morris’ play will be done and he did look good as the starter.
The 3 Losers
Safety Justin Reid: Arguably the best safety in Kansas City was challenged this week. Kyle Pitts, Atlanta wide reciever, is an easy target that involves following and hunting him all game, which is quite a challenge for any safety or linebacker due to his combination of size and speed. No one can blame Reid as Pitts made a 50 yard play on Reid during the first quarter of the game, which was the longest play of the game. This is a classic example of the play against tight ends and running backs throughout this season’s games. Yet, it is also worth mentioning, that besides the long shot played, the defense confined both Pitts as well as running back Bijan Robinson to 3 catches for only 30 yards out of 6 targets.
Quarterback Patrick Mahomes: The Kansas City signal-caller more than welcomed what can be term as constructive criticism after the game because he believes there is room for improvement with his overall performance and indeed there was. Further, some affected situations required a sacrifice of the goal as the Chiefs were forced to convert to a field goal in areas where they would have, for instance, buried the competition instead. On another occasion, he suffered an end zone interception when he attempted to squeeze a throw to Noah Gray tight end over the outstretched arms of the defense. For the second consecutive week, Mahomes was the driving force behind his team’s success. Once again, however, he had backward or sloppy performances in the closing drives, which potential put the game away. Maybe this is too nitpicky there is no one else we would prefer in the entire league and the team is winning even in the bad games he plays. We are simply not satisfied because we want him to be at his best.
Wide receiver Xavier Worthy: The first-round pick was enjoying great success as she had two big plays for 2 touchdowns in Week 1. Since then though, Worthy has only managed to make four catches for 34 yards out of eight attempts, and even struggled to make anything out of designed runs. At certain times, there were some cases where he could have missed his spots on his routes with poor outcomes. These are the kind of challenges most rookies encounter but especially with Kansas City down one of its best receivers, I would like to see Worthy doing more with
