Chiefs vs. Chargers: What we learned in Week 2

From Hunter to Hunted

One of the best things about continuity is being able to see how players develop, both in skill and in personality. I was curious entering the year how the Chiefs would would respond to their new championship moniker.

This was a hungry, perhaps angry, Chargers team that played with a fury reserved for when you’re playing the best team. They were unforgiving on defense, delivered an array of hard hits (some that deserved penalties), and made it clear from the get-go that they were far from intimidated by the champs.

For the majority of the game, the Chargers were the more cohesive, imposing unit. And, when it’s all said and done, this was a bad Chiefs game—among the worst team performances of the Mahomes era. Yet I couldn’t help but walk away from this game feeling confident.

When the Chargers were driving late in the 4th quarter, the CBS camera cut over to Mahomes a few times. He was visibly ticked, practically seething. Down 3 late in the fourth, the Chiefs maneuvered down the field and Harrison Butker eventually tied the game. This field was set up by a couple gutsy Mahomes scrambles and a couple of contested Clyde Edwards-Helaire receptions, one of which was wiped away by a hold. It was a blur of a drive, as anxiety-producing as it was elating. It was a team that played with the scrappiness of a perennial underdog, not one that hoisted a Lombardi just a couple of months ago.

If there was any fear that the champion Chiefs might take it easy today, on a bad day, during a weird season, the team’s chaotic comeback killed it. This comeback didn’t have the dynamism of the Super Bowl or the elegance of their comeback in the 2019 divisional round. It was the kind of comeback that showed, more than anything, the desperation of the team’s mission. And I’d hardly call the Chiefs a desperate team.

I guess the takeaway is that this Chiefs team has a kind of innate motor that drove them even on a shaky day. Call it the Mahomes factor, the reinvigoration of the defense, or just plain leadership. This team looks awfully comfortable as the hunted.