Patrick Mahomes reflects on the Chiefs first loss of the season

Patrick Mahomes spoke to reporters after the Chiefs first loss of the season.

If you wanted to parse the words of Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes after suffering the team’s first loss of the year—and one to the rival Las Vegas Raiders—it all came down to execution in Week 5. Actually, make that a lack of execution.

It sounds funny that Mahomes would point the Chiefs lack of execution on offense as a reason why the team went to 4-1 instead of extending their unbeaten start. After all, the team put up 32 points against the Raiders defense—more than 6 points over the league average of 25.6 points per game. In other words, the offense performed well above average by the most important metric of all—yet if you watched the game you know exactly what Mahomes was referring to.

"“I think we just didn’t execute at a high enough level,” said Mahomes after the game. “In the first half, we started off well. We executed at a high level. Obviously we had some penalties call some stuff back. In the second quarter, we kind of made plays happen, but we weren’t executing at a high enough level. In the third quarter, we couldn’t execute because we weren’t running the plays the right way, and I wasn’t finding the right reads. That carried over and we obviously didn’t play the second half like we wanted to.”"

Despite the team’s 4-1 record, the execution has actually been an issue all season long. For a team that was supposed to be such a well-oiled machine looking to “run it back,” the offense has stalled for long stretches in multiple games. It’s a testament to just how talented these Chiefs are that they’ve put together four wins in five games.

Mahomes acknowledged the season-long issues, save for the team’s dominant win over the Baltimore Ravens. In victories over the Houston Texans in Week 1, Los Angeles Chargers in Week 2, and New England Patriots in Week 4, the Chiefs offense sputtered and even stopped for entire quarters at a time.

"“As far as us offensively, we’ve kind of done it these last few weeks, obviously other than the Ravens game, where we didn’t execute at a high enough level to score and go out there like we’ve been known to score,” said Mahomes. “It caught up with us today.”"

The reality is that even the best teams are going to lose games in the NFL, especially ones who aren’t able to execute their game plan for various reasons—whether that’s an intelligent game plan from an opponent or self-inflicted mistakes.

"“If you don’t play your best football, you lose football games in this league and we didn’t play our best football today,” said Mahomes. “We tried to battle at the end but if you don’t play at a high enough level against football teams, then you’re gonna lose games.”"

Mahomes finished the game with 22 completions on 43 attempts for 340 passing yards and 2 touchdowns. He also tossed his first interception of the season after several close calls. Those miscues are part of the examinatorial work ahead of the Chiefs as they prepare for the Bills in Week 6.

"“We’ve gotta go back and really look at ourselves in the mirror—me at quarterback—and not really rely on these crazy plays where I’m scrambling around and throwing these shots and just execute the offense the way that it’s called, the way it’s supposed to be ran. If we do that, we’ll be a hard team to stop.”"

What Mahomes didn’t say is that the Chiefs, even with the lack of execution, were already hard to stop.