Getty Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes.
The Kansas City Chiefs’ win over the Dallas Cowboys in Week 11 put to rest many negative narratives attached to the team for the better part of two months.
The most common of those narratives was the word “broken,” which had been tied to the team overall, whether it be because of the turnover-happy offense or the defense that seemingly couldn’t stop a cold for the first half of the regular season.
ESPN’s analyst and former NFL defender Ryan Clark used the word “broken” on Monday, November 8 to describe Mahomes and his play, which included seven straight games from Weeks 2-8 with at least one turnover, per Pro Sports Reference. CBS Sports’ insider Jason La Canfora also used that word to describe the team as a whole on October 24 when explaining the lack of balance on offense and the historically bad pace the defense was on up until that point in the season.
However, if there’s one word that can’t be used to describe the Chiefs after Week 11, it’s the word “broken.” That’s why following the win that advanced Kansas City to a 7-4 record, Mahomes addressed that toxic word surrounding the Chiefs and why he believes it wasn’t relevant in the first place.
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Mahomes: Chiefs Were Never Broken
Asked about what his message is in the midst of a four-game win streak for Kansas City, Mahomes spoke about the “Chiefs are broken” narrative that’s been circulating around the NFL this season.
“There’s still a long way to go. Obviously, I knew we were never broken as a team, we have too many good players, too many special guys on this team that go through the process, even when there are bad times or good times,” Mahomes explained during his postgame press conference on Sunday, November 21.
“We’re still early in the season. I know we’ve gotten to that second half, but our goal was to be on top at the end of the season, it’s not to win the regular season. But you have to go through that process every single day or being better and winning that week to be a great team and I think we’re going to try to do that. At the end of the year, we’ll find out what we need to say then.”
Mahomes, Chiefs Finding Form at Right Time
Despite a rough start to the season, Mahomes has bounced back during Kansas City’s win streak to post numbers that better resemble the quarterback that he is. Over the past four games, Mahomes has completed 61.6% of his passes for 1,107 yards, seven touchdowns and only two interceptions. He now has 25 touchdowns and 11 interceptions on the season to go along with a 65.5% completion percentage.
Sitting with a half-game lead in the AFC West as the Chiefs enter their bye, four of the six remaining games on their schedule are division games (Denver Broncos twice, Los Angeles Chargers once, and Las Vegas Raiders once). Because of that, it worked out well that Kansas City dealt with their struggles early in the season, as it didn’t impact their standing in the division significantly thanks to only one of their divisional games taking place in the first nine weeks of the regular season (Chargers, Week 3).
The most important games of the season for Kansas City are coming up, which is perfect timing considering the team is starting to hit its stride.