Mahomes rewarding Chiefs for draft day move
Talk about escapability — Patrick Mahomes was the one who got away.
The Arizona Cardinals had their heart set on taking the Texas Tech quarterback with the 13th pick in the 2017 draft, but the Kansas City Chiefs were fixated on the same player, trading up to leapfrog the Cardinals and select him at No. 10.
With Mahomes off to a record-setting start this season, former Cardinals coach Bruce Arians still feels the sting.
“He was our guy,” said Arians, now a CBS analyst. But former Kansas City general manager John Dorsey “knew it and snuck ahead of us and got him.”
That was a masterstroke. Mahomes, a first-year starter, followed his four-touchdown performance in an opening victory against the Los Angeles Chargers with six more TD passes at Pittsburgh last Sunday. The 10 scoring passes through week 2 are the most by any NFL quarterback through his Patrick Mahomes’ 10 touchdown passes through week 2 set an NFL record for TD passes in the first two games of a season.
team’s first two games.
If Mahomes were to throw for three or more scores against San Francisco on Sunday, he would eclipse Peyton Manning’s league record of 12 in his first three games of 2013.
“You could look at the first game and say, ‘All right, he got off to a good start. Let’s see what he can do on the road in week 2 …
against the Steelers,’” said former NFL quarterback Rich Gannon. “He literally put on a performance. It was a freak show.”
Just another ho-hum outing for a guy who is carving his way into the hearts of Kansas City faithful.
“With this guy, you never feel like, ‘Well, we’ve fallen behind and we can’t make up ground,’ ” Gannon
said. “You could fall behind by a couple, three scores and not panic.”
It helps that the Chiefs are loaded with offensive playmakers such as running back Kareem Hunt, who led the league in rushing as a rookie last season, catch-everything tight end Travis Kelce, wideout Sammy Watkins, and — the player who haunts the dreams of
defensive coordinators — the blistering-fast Tyreek Hill.
As he showed almost 20 years ago with Donovan McNabb in Philadelphia, Chiefs coach Andy Reid specializes in patiently preparing young quarterbacks to step into the fray, and then draws up plays that fit their skills.
“There’s always plays that coach Reid draws up every week,” Mahomes said. “I always say that they always work. He gets on the board in his room and just starts drawing plays. The possibilities are endless.”
It was Mahomes’ expertise on the dry-erase board that had bowled over the Cardinals coaches.
“I loved his mental makeup more than anything,” Arians said. “He’s top four on the board I’ve ever had, up there with Peyton and Andrew (Luck). Amazing recall.”
Agent Leigh Steinberg, who represents Mahomes, has tried to dial down the excitement so Mahomes can play without pressure on his shoulders.
“I spent the entire offseason trying to lower expectations,” Steinberg said. “So many times, a young quarterback goes out and throws an incompletion, throws a couple of interceptions, and people call him a bust.”
But when a quarterback throws 10 touchdowns with no interceptions in two games?
“Well, the secret’s out,” Steinberg said.