Ten Things About Today's Game Week 9: KC 37 Brownouts 21

[gblowfish]

Ten Things About Today’s Game: Week 9: KC 37 CLE 21

10. It was so nice to be able to sleep in today on a wet and cold KC November morning. I went up to my favorite neighborhood diner, the Englewood Cafe, got some carry out breakfast, settled in and watched the game through a fog of Vicks Vapo-Rub, the voice of Mitch Holthaus on the radio and the nasty NyQuil hangover from the overnight. We’ve had a lot of weird games in Cleveland. We've lost crazy overtime games there, we had the Rudd Helmet Tossing Game, and I was afraid this might be a classic “trap game,” with the "Win One For Dorsey" factor. Gregg Williams is a dirty coach, so I was afraid a bunch of our guys -including Mahomes- would have targets on their backs. Except for a foot injury to Sammy Watkins, looks like it was Cleveland that had the injury problems. Their entire defensive secondary was on a conveyor belt to the locker room. That just made things extra easy for Mahomes picking apart Cleveland’s backup secondary, as he threw for 375 yards, his eighth straight 300 yard game.

9. This team may be immune to trap games, as Andy seems to have established a formula that works. We win the coin toss, defer, stop the other team’s first possession, score on our first possession, then make the other team play catch up until they make mistakes that seal the deal. Except for the Pats and Denver game in Denver, that’s been the script, and it works. It’s hard to be picky when the team is 8-1, but there’s a lot of things that can be improved, and really must be improved, if we’re going to make it to the Big Show this February.

8. First big problem is penalties. KC has been Raideresque in their penalties this year. Just too many, and a lot of them have been stupid unsportsmanlike penalties. And it’s been affecting both offense and defense. Today was 11 penalties for 86 yards. That's three times as many as the Browns had. The Chiefs offense had three penalties on ONE PLAY. Defense had Cleveland in a 3rd and 23 at a critical point in the game, made a play and had the Browns stopped to force a 4th and long. Hitchens had to lose his mind with an unsportsmanlike penalty, gives the Browns a first down which allowed them to score. Look, the Browns are a dumpster fire, that’s obvious. But they have a decent offense. If we continue to shoot ourselves in the foot by having double digit penalties, that’s going to be a killer in the playoffs against a good team like the Steelers or Pats. We must get some penalty discipline, and get it soon.

7. Second big problem is tackling. Chubb broke tackle after tackle after tackle. He didn’t make 100 yards but was close enough with 85 yards and a TD. Cleveland averaged over four yards per rush. That’s not good. A team that can stop the run should hold that to three yards or less. We spent a lot of money to STOP THE RUN. C'mon Grandpa Bob, may have to mix in some run blitzes on first down.

6. Third big problem is pass coverage. Defense gave up two passing TDs, and got burned especially on passes to Johnson out of the backfield. Defense gave up just under 400 offensive yards to Cleveland, so once again, the KC offense had to put up big points to run away and hide. One thing I will say, Nelson showed me some heart. In the fourth quarter he got toasted on a bomb to Callaway for 38 yards. After giving up that play he picked Mayfield to kill the drive. Except for his boneheaded unsportsmanlike penalty, Hitchens gutted it up and played with bad ribs - and tied with Nelson for most tackles. Chris Jones got a gift sack when he blew through unblocked with a straight line to Mayfield. Other sack was on a blitz by Lucas, which was his only tackle in the whole game. Kudos to Grandpa Bob for dialing that up. Dee Ford was neutralized, he had one tackle and no sacks. Speaks blew a pass coverage that gave up a first down, but otherwise had some nice plays including stopping the Browns final attempt on fourth and two. That stop sealed the game.

5. Final big problem is clock management. The Chiefs scored on every first half possession except the freaking fiasco at the end of the first half. How can you get an intentional grounding penalty on a spike? I don’t know if that mess was on Mahomes or on Andy or on Bienemy, but if we get in a tight game where we need every point we can get, we can’t be knocking ourselves out of field goal range on something self inflicted like that. And if you’re going to throw a pick on the last play of the half, why not go full Hail Mary? Mahomes can certainly reach the end zone. Run Harris down there and let him go jump ball. Luckily, we got the ball right back to start the second half and drove down and scored seven, so in this case, it didn’t affect the outcome. Again, don’t mean to nit pick, but these are all things we can improve on.

4. This game statistically was pretty even. Chiefs had about 100 yards more total offense. TOP was within a minute on both sides. First downs were basically even, turnovers were even. Chiefs had a lot more penalty yards. Browns missed all three two point conversions. Both QBs were sacked twice, Chiefs were a little better on third down conversions. Williams blocked punt was the turning point in the game. Once that punt was blocked and KC scored another TD immediately afterwards, you could see the air go right out of the Browns sideline. Kudos to the special teams, as that was a big contribution at that point of the game.

3 Today was a great example of how players love to play in front of their hometown friends and family. Kareem Hunt bought 110 tickets to the game for his old high school football team in Cleveland to attend the game. He responds with 141 all purpose yards and three TD. Kelce -who is also from Cleveland- was a dollar short of a Benjamin and scored 2 TDs. Special nod to Spencer Ware, who had a couple of nice catches to sustain drives on third down. Ware reminds me of a back the Chiefs had back in the 90’s named Todd McNair, who was a great back on third down. You could run him between the tackles, or throw the ball to him in the flat. Mahomes and Mayfield both did a nice job of distributing the ball to multiple receivers.

2. Kudos to the offensive line, which was four Cleveland castoffs and Fisher. Fisher only gave up one sack to Garrett, who’s arguably the best pass rusher in the NFL. Mahomes had all day to throw for most of the game. When we get Morse and the Canadian Doc back -IF we get the Doc back- This line should be just fine. No Berry, Dirty Dan or Houston again this week. Hopefully we’ll see at least one and maybe two of them next week. I’m convinced we’ll be lucky to see Berry until sometime in December, if at all.

1. So, 8-1 is fabulous, and at the time of this writing the Bolts are in a tussle with the Seahags. The Fade is a giant sewage pit -like their stadium. Donks are losing to the Texans and they’re done as well. Right now the focus is to try stay ahead of the Pats for a number one seed in the playoffs. If we can get a first round bye, and make teams come to Arrowhead in January, we may have a fighting chance. We have a QB that doesn’t check down and miss wide open receivers 30 yards downfield now. We need the same kind of focus next week as we received this week, as we don’t want to overlook Arizona. I know that’s tempting with a trip to Meh-i-co then the bye the week after, but if things keep rolling we could hit the bye at 10-1. The Holidays could be extra jolly this year, and extra expensive. Better start stashing away some playoff bucks now. You’re gonna need them in January.

[rabblerouser]

Cleveland just missed another two point conversion on the way to KCI...

[Marcellus]

Originally Posted by rabblerouser

Cleveland just missed another two point conversion on the way to KCI...

They played in Cleveland.

[rabblerouser]

Originally Posted by Flying High D

Reid needs to b given some slack. He had a triple stack waiting for him in the locker room.

Steak N Shake?

[Flying High D]

^ I think the game was played in Cleveland. But, they maybe traveling, who knows?

[rabblerouser]

Originally Posted by Marcellus

They played in Cleveland.

Shows you how how many Chiefs fans were in the stands; they thought they were at Arrowhead.

Then they realized all those Chiefs fans were in Cleveland and turned around, missed another 2 pter.

[Flying High D]

Originally Posted by rabblerouser

Steak N Shake?

It was a special that sonic does for him. Bowe turned him onto it.

[rabblerouser]

Originally Posted by Flying High D

^ I think the game was played in Cleveland. But, they maybe traveling, who knows?

What kind of triple stack they got in Cleveland?

I've heard of the triple stacked Steamer from Cleveland...but...

[rabblerouser]

Originally Posted by Flying High D

It was a special that sonic does for him. Bowe turned him onto it.

Shit, I bet Bowe owns a few Sonics in Cleveland.

He could certainly buy 3 or 4 franchises for every catch he made as a Brown.

[Flying High D]

Originally Posted by rabblerouser

What kind of triple stack they got in Cleveland?

I've heard of the triple stacked Steamer from Cleveland...but...

1st layer is spaghetti, hot dog and cheese then you do that stack 2 more times. The steamer you speak of is the shit lasagna.

[ChiefsFanatic]

Originally Posted by gblowfish

Ten Things About Today’s Game: Week 9: KC 37 CLE 21

Great job as always. Here are my thoughts on on your thoughts.

#10 - Dirty Gregg Williams probably received a few more Head Coaching offers during the game. Not only is he dirty, but in every interview that I saw this week he seemed smug and full of himself. I hope that whoever Dorsey hires isn't named Gregg Williams, and fires Gregg Williams immediately after accepting the job.

#9 - I think that even if we lose the coin toss, teams are going to have to choose to possess the ball first instead of deferring. The only team that may choose to let us have it first is probably the Rams.

#8 - The personal fouls and unsportsmanlike misconduct have got to stop. Ultimately, Reid is responsible for getting the penalty situation under control, but most of these types of penalties are on the defensive side of the ball, and to me is just another knock on Sutton. He often stands on the sidelines looking clueless, but I have seen DCs rip their squad for making senseless mental/emotional mistakes like Hitchens did today.

#7 - At one point I thought that Cleveland had figured out what Denver couldn't in two games, and that's to just run the ball down our throats. I hate hearing Reid after the game say that Sutton made good adjustments as a way of explaining why the other team just stopped running the football.

#6 - Speaks did not blow a pass coverage. Saying he blew the pass coverage suggests that he was capable of pass coverage in the first place. I have said it many times this year: There isn't a single offensive skill player in the entire NFL that Speaks can cover in pass coverage. I will forever condemn any defensive play call that has Speaks responsible for a TE or RB in pass coverage.

#5 - After seeing it a couple of times, it kinda looks like Hill could have made a play on the ball, but was surprised when he the ball went over his head. Maybe he thought that Mahomes was throwing it away and was then caught off guard when the ball was in play.

#4 - It's just semantics again, like #6, but saying there was a turning point in the game suggests that at some point in the game the outcome was in doubt. I hate to keep saying this name, but if Alex Smith was under center, I would have felt that a loss was a real possibility, but Mahomes has finally cured my constant apprehension and doubt in games against lesser opponents.

#3 - Mahomes definitely spread the ball around today. Having an offense, in which every eligible receiver is a threat to catch the ball, is fun to watch. But, speaking of eligible receivers, there were a couple of things that really irritated me today. Harris needs to spend an extra hour or two every day after practice catching balls from the jugs machine. He should drill starting right at the machine and work backwards away from the machine in five yard increments. And I know that Hill and Watkins are explosive, but I am really tired of watching our receivers catch the ball and run backwards. Today, on multiple occasions, we caught the ball and lost yards running backwards towards the sideline. Sometimes you have to accept that there are no more yards to be gained, and just protect yourself and go down. It's the receivers equivalent of a QB learning when to throw the ball away to avoid loss of yardage.

#2 - I always knew that Alex Smith put extra pressure on the offensive line to block longer, but it must have been much more pressure than even a Smith hater like myself could have imagined. I think the play of our offensive line, especially with all the injuries, has been one of the most impressive things I have seen this season in the NFL.

#1 - I think that Mahomes is finally the QB that can solve Reid's playoff coaching deficiencies. Now, when Reid, and the Chiefs, have a double digit lead in the 4th quarter of a playoff game, and Reid has abandoned the running game, our QB has enough swagger, and is dynamic enough to force the issue when needed, instead of throwing a 4 yard pass on 3rd & 8.

Sent from my LG-H932 using Tapatalk

[crazycoffey]

Originally Posted by rabblerouser

No.


Per item 3:

"player under center is permitted to stop the game clock legally to save time"

If the clock isn't running, then therefore the player is not legally stopping the clock to save time; e.g. intentional grounding is the correct call.


The Browns got a penalty to stop the clock on the previous play.

The spike by Mahomes was not to prevent time from running off the game clock, BECAUSE THE CLOCK WAS NOT RUNNING AT THE SNAP - instead, Mahomes says he snapped and spiked the ball to save time on the clock from the field of play and to save the timeout...which in that instance, per the rules, the QB has to throw towards a receiver or leave the pocket and throw toward the LOS, or it's IG.

The clock has to be running in order to line up and spike the ball to save time, or its not a legal spike.


Mahomes says he was trying to stop the clock and save the timeout at the end of the half...and that Full Reidtard didn't know he couldn't do that.



That's on Reid for not knowing the rules.

The refs started the clock, the ball was snapped before a second came off. If the snap came a second later it would not have been an intentional grounding. Per the ref announcer guy.

[Buehler445]

Good read George.

I was in and out of the tractor a lot and missed a lot of the game. I appreciate your succinct reviews on days like today.

The unsportsman-like penalties have to go. I obviously didn't see the plays, but it's hard for me to believe that a shit ass horribad Browns team with a new head coach have THAT much more discipline in their execution than we do.

I know I say it a lot but I really can't believe how good Mahomes is after 10 games. Just truly amazing.

[Prison Bitch]

Originally Posted by Discuss Thrower

Where's MeeshMeesh?

[chiefzilla1501]

I was watching highlights of the game today....
His first 4 or 5 throws to Kelce are flat out insane. A few of them might rank as some of his best throws of the year, and that's a very high bar.

[chiefzilla1501]

One thing about Mahomes is he may be starting to feel more comfortable in the pocket when it collapses on him. That was his best game by a mile in terms of sliding around the pocket, and he made some really big league throws. He has a tendency to bootleg wide instead of stepping up. If he adds that to his arsenal, whooo baby!