At least three weeks have passed since our Kansas City Chiefs looked like the Super Bowl contenders I envisioned at the start of the season. Could KC's woes continue when they face off with the last-place, two-win Denver Broncos at Mile High tonight? It seems disturbingly possible.
Nothing about this Chiefs team looks elite right now, and multiple facets of the team are downright awful. An injury to the ankle of the most important man in Kansas City sports just exposed some flaws in the Chiefs' offense. Even with Tyreek Hill back on the field, KC failed to outscore Deshaun Watson and the Houston Texans last Sunday. The injuries to the offensive line continue to make the Chiefs look fragile on the side of the ball where all of us assumed they would dominate. KC's inability to protect the team's most important asset in Patrick Mahomes threatens to invalidate their claim to being among the best teams in the league.
The gameplan to beat the Chiefs now looks simple; teams who get an early lead and run the ball successfully enough to move the chains in the second half just edged out wins against KC in consecutive weeks. For all its flash, a prolific Air Raid-style offense just got outscored on two straight Sundays because of not only the Chiefs' inability to protect their star QB, but also their inability stop the run. The five teams to allow the league's highest rushing yards-per game averages include the Bengals, the Dolphins, the Redskins, the Browns and our Chiefs. That's three awful football teams and two who are failing to live up to lofty expectations because of this exact problem.
While Denver won't light up scoreboards every week, they've played well enough to keep nearly every game within reach this year. The Broncos began their season losing to Oakland, Chicago, Green Bay and Jacksonville, but only the Packers won by more than one possession. Denver then beat the Chargers in Week 5 and shut the Titans out last week. Only three teams in football hold opponents to a lower total yards-per-game average. After starting the year with three straight games without a sack or a takeaway, Denver's defense gelled. Seven sacks and three takeaways resulted in victory during their last effort, the aforementioned 16-0 win against Tennessee.
The Broncos enter this important Thursday encounter with a bunch of momentum, and our Chiefs enter Denver with a bunch of questions. Tonight's result will bring into focus KC's true identity. Teams that we would deem "great" don't lose to a cellar-dwelling division rival after dropping two straight at home. If that happens tonight, then Chiefs Kingdom loses its claim to an elite football team. If the Chiefs win, it will be just one important step on the path to greatness.
Doug LaCerte is too busy overreacting to this mess to bother with Twitter or Facebook.
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