Chiefs-Chargers Rivalry Renewed While KC Tries to Keep Hope Alive

Last week's miserable defeat at the hands of the Houston Texans resulted in yet another ugly stat line for the most important player in Kansas City Chiefs history. Patrick Mahomes finished that sad day with a 19.8 Passer Rating. He's gone two weeks now without a Rating reaching 30. This sent me searching through his career Ratings and QBR's for each season, and just a quick look feels revealing.

The first thing I noticed was just how little Passer Rating and QBR seem to agree. If you only trust Passer Rating, Mahomes has been a mediocre QB more years than not. That clearly means you should absolutely not do that. His current Rating for this season is 91.2, which ranks 16th in the NFL. That's below the standard he sets, but it's remarkably similar to last season's Rating of 93.5, which ranked 17th. He also ranked 14th in Rating in 2023 with a 92.6. 

That data alone would indicate the presence of a consistently mediocre signal-caller, but ESPN's QBR algorithm disagrees. Patrick's QBR ranks 4th in the league right now. He finished at 8th over the last two seasons. That brings us to 2022, when a new, disturbing pattern emerges.

Mahomes was awesome in 2022 and 2020, and every measurable agrees with that. 2021 showed yet more disparity between Rating and QBR, when Mahomes was 15th in Rating and 5th in QBR. That season, however, is the only time in this amazing stretch from 2018 to 2022 that Mahomes did not finish a season ranked top-seven in both categories. Most of this production came with freakishly athletic receiver Tyreek Hill on the team and Eric Bieniemy coordinating the offense. Mahomes' incredible 2022 campaign happened without Tyreek.

Bienemy is currently the running backs coach for the Chicago Bears. The Bears average 152.6 rushing yards a game this season. They have the most potent running game in their conference and perhaps in the league. What a perfect compliment to Patrick that would be. For now, though, the questions about next season stay on the back-burner as long as KC has hope for a playoff berth in 2025. That all depends on KC's ability to overcome one of the league's strongest defenses when they face the Los Angeles Chargers at Arrowhead today.

The Chargers defense ranks fourth in total yards allowed per game and 10th in points allowed. They've tallied up more interceptions than any team aside from the Chicago Bears. The offense has been mostly average this season, thanks in part to numerous injuries to key parts of their offensive line, but they still rank 9th in rushing yards per game. Surprisingly, the highly talented Justin Herbert has the potential every week to be the team's biggest problem. He's even the reason I'm picking the Chiefs this week.

Despite having similar overall turnover differentials, with the Chargers at +1 and KC at -1, Herbert is the biggest liability L.A will have on the field today. Only Tua Tagovailoa and Geno Smith have thrown more than Herbert's 11 interceptions this season. The Chargers have a few impressive pelts on the wall after beating the Chiefs in Week 1 in Brazil, Denver in Week 3 and Philly in overtime last week, but they also suffered some embarrassing losses. Defeats at the hands of the Giants and Commanders, and double-digit defeats when facing Jacksonville and Indy all included at least one Justin Herbert interception. I'm predicting at least one more pick from Herbert as KC keeps the embers of hope warm by beating the Chargers 22-19.