Will Tough Texans Test Mahomes' Messed-Up Ankle?

Chiefs Kingdom is concerned about Patrick Mahomes. No, it's not because of his relatively low Passer Rating in 2024. The Kingdom is concerned about Mahomes - the most important athlete in Kansas City sports history - facing a strong Houston Texans pass-rush after an ankle injury. Houston ranks second league-wide in sacks with 45, and prior to last week's game, the Chiefs went through a three-game stretch when they allowed Mahomes to get sacked 13 times. Keeping Mahomes upright and healthy today will be key in keeping the 11-3 Buffalo Bills far away from the #1 seed in the AFC playoff bracket.

A hamstring injury to newly acquired left tackle D.J. Humphries could make this difficult, but I'm not worried about KC overcoming this issue. Last week, the Chiefs responded to this injury by placing all-time great left guard Joe Thuney at the left tackle position. This resulted in exactly zero sacks allowed for Kansas City. Mahomes obviously still dealth with pressure to the point where his ankle got twisted up and hurt, but it doesn't take a major in mathematics to know that zero sacks is the best number of sacks to allow. The rest of the math indicates that KC will have a tough time scoring on this stout Texans defense regardless of Mahomes' ability to overcome this much-talked-about bum ankle.

Houston's defense ranks in the top ten in passing yards and points allowed this season. They rank fourth overall in total yards allowed. Their defense also excels at forcing turnovers. The Texans defense currently ranks second league-wide in interceptions and total takeaways with 19 and 28, respectively. All this is evidence that Kansas City will struggle to score a bunch, but even Texans fans would agree that the Chiefs don't need 30 points on the board to achieve victory today.

C.J. Stroud is experiencing a legitimate sophomore slump. His impressive rookie season Passer Rating of 100.8 has dropped to 89 this season. His future is still bright, but it's a clear and noteworthy drop-off in production. Stroud's passing yards-per-game average is down over 40 yards, he's nearly doubled his interception total, and he's thrown six fewer touchdown passes in this season's 14 games than in the 15 games he played in last season. With both QB's in today's game not living up to their lofty standards of excellence, it may be time for the running backs to shine.

Despite missing key pieces to their rushing attack throughout practically the entire season, the Chiefs have raised their rushing yards-per-game average from 104.9 last season to 112.1. With a healthy Isiah Pacheco and a Kareem Hunt with way more tread on the tires than almost anyone expected, that average can be improved upon over these last three games of the season. For that reason, I'm expecting KC to win a gritty 20-16 game today. KC has a nice two-game cushion over Buffalo in that race for the #1 seed, but the Bills play the Pats twice in three weeks with the Jets in-between. KC's chance to secure the playoffs bye week and also rest their starters in the final week of the regular season will be all the motivation they need to finish the regular season looking strong.