The Kansas City Chiefs are lucky to be in the AFC West these days.
Earlier this year, Andy Reid's team was 6-1 and powering through the schedule with a defensive juggernaut holding opponents to minimal production and an offense doing just enough. As it turns out, sustaining such an approach with little margin is tough to do in the NFL these days and the Chiefs have now lost three of their last five games.
The Chiefs schedule was supposed to get tougher in the second half, but many of those opponents don't look so great these days. However, the Chiefs certainly didn't expect to split a season series with the Denver Broncos or fall to the Green Bay Packers. A defeat against the Philadelphia Eagles is understood given that someone was going to lose such a big game, but now it's looking like a trend is in motion.
So where does that leave the Chiefs? They should consider themselves fortunate. Consider if they played in the AFC South where there are three teams with 7 wins. Or the AFC North, which is a gauntlet of rivals beating each other up while every other franchise gets to sit back and enjoy the show. Instead, the Chiefs have the Las Vegas Raiders with an interim head coach, the Los Angeles Chargers with a lame duck head coach, and the Broncos with a first-year head coach.
Credit the Broncos for rising up after an abysmal early season schedule and playing tough. They're sitting at 6-6 with reason to believe they can compete for a playoff spot. Technically no one in the division has been eliminated from postseason contention yet, but the sledding gets harder for the division's lesser opponents at 5-7 each.
With five games remaining, however, the Chiefs hold on the division is less than it was a month ago. Anything can happen in this mixed-up league, especially after watching the Chiefs wither in primetime.
Here's a current look at the AFC West standings in Week 14
- Kansas City Chiefs — 8-4
- Denver Broncos — 6-6
- L.A. Chargers — 5-7
- Las Vegas Raiders — 5-7