Patrick Mahomes AFC Championship review; Playing like a "quarterback"
Patrick Mahomes AFC Championship review; Playing like a "quarterback"
Mahomes had to be a different sort of player with his superpowers muted. And he did just that, silencing narratives that should have been silenced long ago.
“If you took away Tyreek Hill…”
“If you took away all those weapons…”
“If Andy Reid wasn’t always winning plays…”
“If you took away all that schoolyard football…”
“…he’s the most talented and… the most dynamic weapon… (someone else) is the best quarterback when it comes to quarterbacking.”
We’ve heard them all. And so has Patrick Mahomes.
Since he took the league by storm in 2018, it seems as though people have spent as much time explaining away Mahomes’ greatness as they have marveling at… well, his greatness. It was the weapons. It was Andy Reid. It was luck. It was “fake” quarterbacking that had a limited shelf life.
On Sunday, in the AFC Championship against the Cincinnati Bengals, Mahomes had to face down pretty much every single one of those narratives. Tyreek Hill was long gone. The Chiefs lost multiple receivers to injury. Lou Anaruno, Cincinnati’s defensive coordinator, was staying step for step with Reid. Travis Kelce was being bracketed constantly.
And perhaps most importantly, Mahomes’ super power, his freakish ability to create something out of nothing, was handicapped after a high ankle sprain a mere 8 days earlier. Mahomes had managed to do what was necessary against an inferior defense and with more of his weapons healthy in the Divisional round, but this was different.
So how did Mahomes perform? Well, you know how the game ended.
But what did it look like on film? With a week to prepare for being merely mortal, how did Mahomes adjust his game? As ever, we go to the film to answer such questions. And in the answers we see a quarterback who is somehow better than ever after a historic start to his career. Because he’s better at… well, quarterbacking.
If you are unfamiliar with how I chart and write about quarterback play, the (unlocked) Week 1 review explains the methodology and reasoning, as well as the definitions used. The goal, as ever, is to separate the QB’s play from what is around the QB to get a better gauge on how he did on his own. You can find the previous pieces by clicking the links below:
Let’s talk about Mahomes, adaptability, and being the best quarterback in the world on one good leg.
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