Are the Kansas City Chiefs struggling with overconfidence?
The Kansas City Chiefs seemed to take the night off against the New England Patriots, and the question has to be asked, are they overconfident?
During the 2015-2016 NBA season, the Golden State Warriors broke the NBA record for wins with 73, losing a mere nine games during the regular season. While they failed to win the NBA championship, it was clear their new jump-shooting brand of basketball coupled with two of the greatest and most consistent shooters in NBA history made them nearly unstoppable.
All they did the following offseason was add Kevin Durant, who at the time was arguably the most dominant player in the NBA. If Durant caught the ball anywhere close to the basket, it was almost a guaranteed bucket. Unsurprisingly, this led to a lack of effort in a number of contests during the 2016-2017 NBA regular season.
It’s understandable, right? A team that won the most games ever, with two of the best players in the league and a stacked roster, ascended to another level of superstardom with Durant. They could conceivably turn it on at the drop of a hat and destroy teams, which they did numerous times that season.
Does this sound familiar? Because it should. While the 2019 Kansas City Chiefs didn’t break the record in terms of regular season wins, they set many impressive ones. The most impressive being that they came back from a double-digit deficit three straight times in the playoffs—an NFL record—and averaged nearly 40 points a game against the best teams on the brightest of stages.
What we’ve seen so far this season, similar to the Warriors in the 2016-2017 season, is a team that has the ability to raise their level of focus and precision in the brightest moments but has a tendency to play down to their competition in others.
I don’t blame them. A rookie quarterback in Week 2 and a journeyman quarterback who’s lost 10 straight games in Week 4 have no business beating the defending Super Bowl champions.
Still, this is the NFL and as the saying goes, on any given Sunday the worst team can beat the best, especially when you are talking about the defending champions, who undoubtedly draw every competitor’s best shot.
There will be those that look at Monday night’s game against the Patriots and think, gosh, if only the Patriots had Cam Newton, they’d have won the game. If we’re honest, if the Patriots had Cam Newton, I can guarantee Andy Reid and Patrick Mahomes don’t play their proverbial cards so close to their chests.
The game plan was the definition of conservative, including several head-scratching run plays, and Patrick Mahomes added to this by playing in an uncharacteristically lackadaisical fashion. It was clear, from top to bottom, the Chiefs believed they would roll the Patriots and were committed to hiding any creativity from Bill Belichick on the off chance the teams meet in the playoffs.
Andy Reid has never said this, but for those who’ve watched the Chiefs religiously, it’s obvious this is something he does from time to time. On the one hand it’s smart, as you want to save your best stuff for when it matters most.
A win is a win, especially when you’re competing against one of the most dynamic and flexible thinkers in coaching history in Bill Belichick. Yet, if the Chiefs plan to repeat as Super Bowl champions, they need to evaluate the effect that perceived overconfidence can accidentally have. It takes one bad bounce to turn an ugly win in the regular season into a season-ending loss in the postseason.