Field stretching, YAC, and back shoulder throws; Juju and MVS are starting to make their mark with the Chiefs
Looking at the way the new Chiefs' receivers skillsets are being worked into an offense that, as it is still finding itself, showed scary potential against the 49ers
Remember ages and ages ago, when we were worried about the Chiefs offense and whether it could ever find answers against a good pass rush and aggressive man coverage? Whoops, that was (checks notes) two days ago, when reviewing Patrick Mahomes’ film vs the Bills led to some real questions about how the supporting cast was performing against high-level competition.
Man, lot can change after just one game. Of course, it helps when that game is absolutely dominant, which is exactly what the Chiefs were on offense against the 49ers.
San Francisco’s defense, which is hailed as one of the best in the league when healthy and saw most of its stars return to action against Kansas City, had no answers for Mahomes and company. This is a defense that was (prior to the game) ranked 3rd in the league in defensive efficiency per Football Outsiders, and it was rendered helpless to even slow the Chiefs’ offense following an early turnover.
That blowout, which was reminiscent of the destruction of Tampa Bay’s much-heralded defense (4th in defensive efficiency per Football Outsiders), came following a mistake-laden game against still another top-5 defense (the Bills). After the Bills game, I wrote about how the Chiefs had hurt themselves with unforced errors that took multiple points off the board. That was similar to their only other “bad” offensive game of the year (against the Colts), which featured the most bizarre special teams day I’ve ever seen and a performance in which the Chiefs cost themselves approximately 3 touchdowns worth of points.
The reason I bring all this up is that, despite a couple of hiccups, the offense is… right back to being the best in the league in terms of moving the ball. And a big part of that are new wide receivers Juju Smith-Schuster and Marquez Valdes-Scantling.
Smith-Schuster had a productive game against the Bills last week that was overshadowed by the loss, and MVS has been up and down as the Chiefs try to learn where he fits into what they want to do. But as the year has moved along, both of them have shown what the offense can look like as they grow more and more comfortable in their roles (and Mahomes/Reid, in turn, grow more comfortable with them).
And what it looks like is close to unstoppable, at least when the offensive line is playing even remotely well.
Let’s talk about MVS and Smith-Schuster (in that order, as of the two of them Juju has the more critical role in unlocking the Chiefs’ offense) and how their skillsets helped the Chiefs beat the brakes off the Niners’ defense.