The Kansas City Chiefs had a few figures come up with significant vote totals in the MMQB’s tabulation of their season-ending awards.
The Kansas City Chiefs have their collective eyes on a single award: the Lombardi Trophy. Everything else is either the cherry on top or a consolation prize depending on what happens on their way to a hopeful Super Bowl run. That said, in the midst of an injury-filled year in which stats overall were down for any player to lay claim to a major award, it’s nice to see Patrick Mahomes and Juan Thornhill, among others, still earn major consideration for the year-end awards from the folks at Sports Illustrated/Monday Morning Quarterback.
The writers at MMQB just posted their winners and complete vote totals for awards ranging from Most Valuable Player to Coach of the Year and the usual suspects walked away with most honors. That said, the Chiefs registered higher than you might expect in a few categories.
Patrick Mahomes missed two full games with a dislocated knee and played all season with one injury or another, from a sore ankle to the lingering effects of the knee issue, to a hit on his throwing hand. Somehow, last year’s MVP still finished up No. 3 overall in the 2019 MVP voting behind Lamar Jackson of the Baltimore Ravens and Russell Wilson of the Seattle Seahawks. Mahomes finished the season with 26 touchdowns, nearly half of last year’s total of 50.
The other big surprise showing was at Defensive Rookie of the Year where Juan Thornhill, who unfortunately just tore his ACL before the postseason could begin, finished fourth overall. While Chiefs Kingdom knows how valuable Thornhill had become, it wasn’t clear that the rest of the league was as aware of his development this year. Nick Bosa took top honors, but Thornhill was the only defensive back to earn any votes (17 points) besides Chauncey Gardner-Johnson (2). That was a surprise.
Other Chiefs to appear on lists include Andy Reid getting a couple votes for Coach of the Year (tied for 9th with Bill Belichick), an honor that went to John Harbaugh of the Ravens. Brett Veach also received a handful of votes for Executive of the Year, although that top award went to Eric DeCosta of the Ravens as well. (Are we sensing a pattern here?)
Tight end Travis Kelce finished 9th overall in Offensive Player of the Year, a category that exists to primarily move quarterbacks out of the way so that someone like wideout Michael Thomas can win an award.
You can see the full list of awards here. Hats off to MMQB for being transparent with their process and vote totals.