Chiefs Film Room: The offense showed its true colors
By Tarek Mavani
Play #2
Outside of Cam Newton and Russell Wilson, I can’t think of a QB who executes the read-option better than Smith. When you have one of the most effective runners at the QB position that also happens to be pretty smart, a high success rate is really no surprise.
With the ball in his hands, Smith never shows his cards and does a fantastic job of forcing the LB to commit. Once the ball is flipped to Ware, he sees nothing but green thanks to fantastic blocks by the RT Schwartz, and TE Travis Ross. When great play-calling meets perfect execution, chunks of yards and first downs begin to look effortless.
Play #5
I was pretty sure this play was going to be run when watching live. I mean 3rd-and-3 when you’re in FG range and it’s OT? This had conservative written all over it. But man was I glad to be wrong.
The Chargers line up in Cover 1 and bring the pressure on the outside. But by going Cover 1 with Kelce split out wide at the bottom of your screen, it forces a safety to cover him with absolutely no help – a mismatch 90 percent of the time.
Smith spots this pre-snap, hangs in there while the pocket collapses around him, and places the ball exactly where it needed to be. Kelce does his job, which is to beat a defender that absolutely has no business covering him, and hauls in the pass for a first down (subsequently breaking the spirits of both Charger fans and players alike).
Next: Moving toward the end zone...