What we learned about the Kansas City Chiefs in Week 8 against Broncos

The Kansas City Chiefs swept the Denver Broncos with their victory on Sunday afternoon at Arrowhead Stadium. What did the film show us from the game?

The Kansas City Chiefs were able to come out with a victory once again against the Denver Broncos on Sunday afternoon completing the sweep this season. The victory was Patrick Mahomes‘ third victory against the Broncos making his record 3-0 against the divisional opponent. However, Denver continued to play hard against Kansas City and give the offense struggles as they did in Week 4.

Even with the struggles on the offense, the team was still able to put up 30 points on Denver’s defense. When we talk about struggling only putting up 30 points in a game, it shows how much the offense has been explosive under Patrick Mahomes in 2018 compared to that of Alex Smith in recent years including last season.

Kansas City got out to an early lead, despite not scoring on their opening drive for the first time all season. While the Chiefs were up by two touchdowns going into the fourth quarter, the offense stalled out in the fourth not scoring a single point and letting Denver close the gap. The defense was able to keep the Broncos in check along with a nice onside kick recovery by fullback Anthony Sherman.

As I went through the film when the All-22 came out, I wanted to look for areas that aren’t always covered by the box score. I wanted to break down what happened in this game with a more in-depth approach. As I took a look closer into the film, there were a significant amount of things I and most fans likely missed just watching the game live. Let’s take a look at what the film showed us with Kansas City against Denver and what it could mean going forward.

The pass rush is still productive without Justin Houston

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If you would have told me before the season that Justin Houston would be missing some time, I would have said the pass rush will likely fall off a cliff. Given what we knew before the season, there wasn’t anything that could have predicted this kind of pass rush despite Houston being injured. Dee Ford continues to look like a beast week after week which is something we have been waiting five years to see.

There’s no doubt that Ford had earned the bust label in most Kansas City fan’s eyes including mine. Before this season, Ford had struggled with his size on the outside, not developing a plan when rushing the passer, not displaying more than one move being the bull rush that goes against his size, the inability to stop the rushing attack and to even be on the field. He showed glimpses of being a good pass rusher at times but was never close to being consistent.

He had a good showing in 2016 while Houston was out for most of the first half of the season, but it was still inconsistent and he ended up getting hurt as Houston came back. He was out most of the year last year with another injury which led to the debates on whether he should start this season given that the Chiefs were forced to pay his fifth-year option.

Ford came into 2018 saying all of the same things that he did in years past which gave me little confidence about him all of a sudden changing his performance level. We hadn’t seen the progression from him aside from a small glimpse in 2016 when he was still inconsistent. This season has been a completely different story as he is one of the best pass rushers in the league after eight games.

The consistency has been outstanding as Ford has been a nightmare for opposing offenses every single week. When the news that Houston was going to be out for a couple of weeks broke, I surely thought some of that production would go down without Houston getting most of the attention. I was wrong which I am completely satisfied with.

In this last game against Denver, Ford came up with three sacks, eight pressures, and two forced fumbles on Case Keenum. Given that rookie linebacker Breeland Speaks was on the other side and Ford was receiving most of the attention, he was still able to make big play after big play. We have seen a completely different player.

When watching the Denver game, you can see that Ford has a better plan for rushing the passer. If the initial plan doesn’t work, Ford is planning ahead to make another move to get home. He’s also cleaned up his routes around the edge. Ford has always had a great first step to go with his speed, but early in his career would take wide angles to the quarterback or simply get pushed way out of the play. That’s not been the case in 2018 as he has been better at keeping to his lane and stronger fighting tackles off of him.

Through eight games of football, Ford has tallied 26 hurries, 10 quarterback hits, and nine sacks this season according to my charting. It’s going to be extremely hard for Kansas City this offseason when they try and figure out the roster and whether or not to sign Ford to a long-term deal, franchise tag him or let him go. At this point, I can’t see the Chiefs organization willing to let him move on.

Breeland Speaks has been getting almost all of the snaps opposite of Ford with Houston out and second-year linebacker Tanoh Kpassagnon coming back from his own injury. Whether or not Kpassagnon got limited playing time against Denver was a result of easing him back in I’m not sure. I still like what Tanoh brings to this point over Speaks, but to my surprise, Speaks has been better after getting some significant snap counts.

I’m not ready to call Speaks a good pass rusher, but the amount of progression I’ve seen from a guy that looked completely out of position just a month ago has me excited to see what he can become. I would love to admit that I was wrong if he ends up becoming a good pass rusher in the next year or two. The interesting part about Speaks is that one area I thought he would be excelling at is setting the edge in the running game.

Despite his size and strength, Speaks has struggled when setting the edge. It’s not quite to the point where he is an extreme liability, but it’s an area that absolutely needs improving. The fact that he has been a decent pass rusher already the last few games gives me hope for the future.

Sammy Watkins is worth the contract

One debate that has carried over from the offseason has been whether or not wide receiver Sammy Watkins would be worth the contract the Chiefs gave him. When looking at the numbers from his short career before this season, it seemed outrageous that Kansas City gave him such a massive deal. It also seemed impossible given the weapons already in the offense that Watkins could live up to that money.

That is where the debate begins and depending on your opinion or view of what is worth the money is where you will land on the debate. Many fans want big box score numbers from a player being paid that much money. My thoughts are not just Watkins’ stats over the duration of the contract, but how much the offense benefits from him being on the field.

We all remember the first Denver game this season in Week 4 when the offense took a step back. I truly believe that much of that stalling was due to the injury of Watkins early in the game. It seemed that Sammy was the prime target for the gameplan in that game and when he left the game early, the scheme was not working against the Broncos defense. Mahomes had to carry this offense back to win despite the scheme not dominating and players around him struggling.

Given that Watkins hasn’t had the biggest numbers through the first seven games had many fans ready to call this deal a bust. His game against Denver this past weekend took some of that debate off of the table catching eight of nine targets for 107 yards and two touchdowns. Six of those eight catches were also first downs.

The first four games of the season it was obvious that Watkins was still learning the new offense. We’ve all heard about how hard Andy Reid‘s playbook is to master and how it usually takes a season or two for a player to accel. However, in the last four games, Watkins has been playing extremely well without many fans even know it because his box score numbers haven’t been impressive.

The Week 8 game against Denver was only the second time that Watkins had surpassed 100 yards receiving. That isn’t due to Watkins not performing at a high level. It’s more due to the number of weapons on this offense and where the game plan is focused. When a team has as many playmakers as the Chiefs do on offense, there are going to be games where some of those playmakers have a quiet game.

During this game specifically, we were able to see Sammy’s traits come to the spotlight considering he was getting the targets that he hadn’t been in recent games. Watkins is big, physical, and has the explosiveness to go along with it. He gets great separation from his defender. We saw him use his speed to get separation and make yards after the catch. We also saw him use his size and strength to fight off defenders after the catch.

Given the amount of success this offense has had in 2018, Watkins is absolutely worth the money. He was clearly the major focus in the gameplan as Mahomes looked for him with his first read more often than in previous games. Some of the catches that he made against the Broncos who were covering him well were impressive. Even when he’s not a big part of that week’s gameplan, Watkins draws attention from the other playmakers allowing for better matchups for the other playmakers.

The offensive line is handling injuries

Last season we saw a similar situation as we are seeing in 2018. Center Mitch Morse and right guard Laurent Duvernay-Tardif both sustained injuries around the same time last year and it turned out to be catastrophic for the offensive line unit. It was during that midseason slump last season and with both of those players being out, it caused massive problems for the offense.

This season has been an entirely different story at least in the passing game. LDT has been placed on Injured Reserve and Mitch Morse has missed the last two games due to a concussion. Last week, Jordan Devey filled in for Morse at center while Andrew Wylie took over right guard. Devey sustained an injury sending him to Injured Reserve as well which led to Austin Reiter getting the start.

Denver’s front seven has some great pass rushers not only on the outside in Von Miller and Bradley Chubb, but on the inside as well. Even with the third center for the team getting his first start with the unit, Kansas City’s offensive line was still able to hold their own. In fact, the only offensive lineman that I would say had a rough day was left guard Cam Erving.

Erving allowed three pressures on Mahomes up the middle against Denver. Outside of that, the offensive line kept playing well despite the massive losses it continues to endure. Patrick Mahomes was only sacked twice on the day and Reither didn’t allow a single hurry from what I saw.

Unfortunately, while the line continues to look good in pass blocking, the run blocking was not that great against Denver. That has a lot to do with the injuries which are to be expected. Kareem Hunt was unable to get the run game going, but that didn’t stop the offense from putting up thirty points on a divisional opponent.

Injuries are hurting the defense

The Chiefs defense has been playing better during the last four games aside from maybe the New England game. However, the injuries continue to happen and players continue to make frustrating mistakes. The player that probably had the worst game of the entire Chiefs roster against the Broncos was safety Ron Parker.

This quite possibly was the worst game of Parker’s this season. Both of the touchdowns likely fall on his lack of production and busted coverage. The Chiefs when playing in zone coverage often found Parker playing too far forward when he was in a deep coverage role, and Parker failed on multiple occasions to pick up his assignment which led to huge touchdowns. If he doesn’t completely blow those coverages on those two touchdowns, we might be talking about a completely different outcome.

The inside linebacker position is another area that continues to be a major concern. Anthony Hitchens took a big shot to the ribs on Sunday which means he might be missing some time. Diagnosed with severely bruised ribs, Hitchens has still been more of a disappointment than a savior at this point in the season. Hitchens and Reggie Ragland both have looked slow physically and mentally.

Both linebackers continue to look hesitant and when they do react, they are either too late with an offensive lineman getting to the second level already, take poor angles leading to bigger gains, or absolutely lost in coverage. Given that Hitchens could miss time and Terrance Smith has already been sent to Injured Reserve, Dorian O’Daniel got more playing time this week along with undrafted rookie Ben Niemann.

O’Daniel continues to look excellent in an area that the Chiefs have been gashed against. Running backs coming out of the backfield have torched Kansas City for many weeks, but with DOD getting on the field, that’s not been the case. He’s shown what we saw from his college tape as he’s quick to react and shoots out of a cannon when getting after the ball carrier. O’Daniel has single handedly taken the running backs out of the game in the passing attack for the most part.

An area that O’Daniel has struggled is against the rushing attack up the middle. Offensive linemen tend to get ahold of O’Daniel and he hasn’t quite figured out how to get around them or shed the blockers to this point. There were multiple times where he was pushed completely out of the play allowing for a decent run.

Next: Chiefs fans are placing unfair expectations on young defenders

Niemann on the other hand looked good against the run game. I’m not going to set high expectations for the undrafted rookie, but I could easily see him getting more playing time and rotating with O’Daniel depending on the package until Hitchens is able to return.