Chiefs: What Happened to the Defense?
Sep 13, 2015; Denver, CO, USA; Denver Broncos quarterback Peyton Manning (18) high fives teammates prior to their game against the Baltimore Ravens at Sports Authority Field at Mile High. Mandatory Credit: Ron Chenoy-USA TODAY Sports
To be fair, they have not had it easy to start the year. There are six undefeated NFL teams right now, and the Chiefs have played three of them in consecutive weeks. Two of those teams were led by Aaron Rodgers and Peyton Manning. And Kansas City has only been in the friendly confines of Arrowhead Stadium once this year.
No defense comes out completely unscathed from that scenario, especially when the offense has made enough costly mistakes that it may feel like the defense is trying to minimize damage instead of helping to win a game. But those factors are not enough to explain what we have been seeing.
K.C. played good quarterbacks last year. They went up against Manning and Phillip rivers twice each, and also faced Russell Wilson, Ben Roethlisberger, Carson Palmer, and Tom Brady. Those high-level quarterbacks made up half of the Chiefs schedule, and the Kansas City defense did not allow any them to score 30 or more points. In fact, they didn’t allow 30 or more points in any game in 2014.
They have allowed over 30 points in each of the last three games.
And in addition to allowing more points than at any time last season, they are also allowing more yards. The Chiefs only allowed 400+ yards once last season, in the still-perplexing debacle to start the year against Tennessee. And even then, the most they only allowed 405. Kansas City has already allowed more than that twice this season, with their last two games having seen the opposing team rack up 448 and 445 total yards respectively.
This is also the same defense that spent the majority of that season having allowed zero touchdowns on the ground. And they did that without the services of Johnson and DeVito. The defense has already given up four rushing touchdowns this year.
And though this season is young, the defense has seemed to be on a negative trend. K.C. has allowed more points almost with each passing game (20, 31, 38, and 36 in that order). They have also stopped creating turnovers. They took the ball away from Houston twice, once from Denver, and then never from either Green Bay or Cincinnati.
And there is similar story to be told with sacks. The Chiefs had five against the Texans, three against the Broncos, one against the Packers, and none against the Bengals. Of course, you would expect there to have been more sacks on Ryan Mallet and Brian Hoyer than against Manning, Rodgers, or Andy Dalton, but that drop off is still troubling.
How can this be?
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