Kansas City Chiefs “turnover” a new leaf against New York Jets
While the six interceptions are definitely the flashy stat that will get the most attention it may not even be the most encouraging stat of the game when it comes to the pass defense. That honor should go to the 15 passes defended that the Chiefs had. To put that in context, the Chiefs had only seven passes defended last week in their loss to the Texans and just three in their opener against the Chargers.
What that means is that the Chiefs didn’t just make big plays they consistently had tight coverage on the Jets receivers all game long. I haven’t gone back and watched the game a second time yet, but my initial reaction is that Marcus Peters, Steven Nelson, Eric Berry, Ron Parker, and Derrick Johnson all had very good days in coverage overall. If the Chiefs are able to cover like they did on Sunday (even without all the interceptions) then their defense is going to be very hard to score against.
The pass rush was definitely a concern going into this game. The Chiefs may not have recorded a single sack on Sunday but it felt like they were constantly putting pressure on Fitzpatrick. The defensive line seems to be coming into their own after a rough first week against the Chargers. They were solid against the Texans last week and they were good again on Sunday against the Jets. Not only did they collapse the pocket against the Jets, but they did a great job of corralling Matt Forte and the New York rushing attack. Forte was averaging 26 carries and 98 yards rushing per game so far this season but only had 15 for 65 against the Chiefs.
While the defense had a banner day the offense continues to be a work in progress. There were times on Sunday where the offense looked very good. However, when a team has eight turnovers and only scores 24 points, that’s not all that impressive. Then when you factor in that the Chiefs returned two of those eight turnovers directly for touchdowns (meaning that KC only mustered 10 points on offense off the other six) things actually look pretty bad in terms of offensive production.
In my opinion, things were going fine up until Spencer Ware’s touchdown dive was ruled a fumble. Had that touchdown stood, the Chiefs would have had 17 points on offense and we probably aren’t having this discussion.
Unfortunately, the touchdown didn’t stand and the Chiefs offense basically disappeared from that point on. Up until then the Chiefs did a great job of mixing in some Ware runs (he finished with 75 yards rushing) with quick short passes. The Jets have a great defensive front and with the Chiefs down both of their starting guards (and one of their backups) it was a smart game plan by Andy Reid. Alex Smith was really accurate for most of the game (although he did miss a wide open Conley late in the game) and did a masterful job of spreading the ball around to nine different targets. He finished 25 of 33 (75.8%) for 237 yards, a touchdown and no interceptions.