KC’s Reid outcoached McDermott
ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. – There are many reasons Andy Reid is considered one of the best coaches in the NFL, and one that sometimes gets overlooked was on full display against the Bills.
Unlike so many formula-driven coaches who spend all week devising what they think is the perfect game plan and then stubbornly refuse to alter it once the game begins, even if things go sideways, the Chiefs’ coach is nimble and adjustable, not to mention smart.
He recognized right away the Bills were going to sit back in pass coverage and make sure Patrick Mahomes didn’t hit any of his patented home runs Monday night, so what did he do? He basically took the ball out of the hands of the best quarterback in the league and fed it to rookie running back Clyde EdwardsHelaire.
What did the Bills do in response?
They continued to worry about Mahomes and the passing game and were powerless to stop the Kansas City running game, which ultimately decided the outcome.
“We’re best when we have some kind of a balance going, when you can kind of go back and forth,” said Reid. “It puts a tremendous amount of pressure on the defense. And so we were able to do both, and we felt like we needed both.”
Buffalo coach Sean McDermott talked Monday night about picking your poison against the Chiefs because you can’t stop everything; they’re simply too dynamic. Understandable, to a point, but there needed to be a change in the plan and there really wasn’t.
The Chiefs’ 46 rushing attempts were their most ever in Reid’s 22 years as a head coach in Philadelphia and Kansas City. The 245 yards were the Chiefs’ most since 2012, the year before Reid took over as coach.
Further, this was the first game in Mahomes’ career in which the Chiefs rushed for more than 200 yards, and it was also the first time they rushed for more yards than Mahomes had passing.
“Once we saw how deep their linebackers and safeties and corners were playing, we knew that we had the run game,” said Mahomes. “So we really just stayed with it, and if teams are going to play us like this, you’re going to see us run the football, and we have the guys that can do it.’’
What helped the Chiefs with this strategy was their absolute dominance up front. Many fans and reporters have been questioning the viability of the Bills’ defensive line this season. That includes McDermott and defensive coordinator Leslie Frazier who decided to make underperforming Trent Murphy and Harrison Phillips healthy inactives.
Those moves mattered little. The Chiefs’ line, minus two starters by early in the first quarter, blew the Bills off the ball. In the middle, tackles Ed Oliver, Vernon Butler and Quinton Jefferson were flat out terrible, and while Zimmer made a couple of nice plays, he wasn’t that much of an upgrade over Phillips.
“Everybody knows, when it comes to football, it starts up front,” said Edwards-Helaire, who had 161 yards. “The line did their job. They made things move. They made everything easier for me. Ultimately, it’s not just me. This is a career day for the entire O-line.”
The Chiefs had seven runs of 10 yards or more. Counting scrambles by Mahomes, and not counting a late kneeldown, they ran on first down 20 times and piled up 135 yards, an average of 6.75 yards per attempt, meaning they were rarely behind the sticks.
According to ESPN, 197 of the rushing yards came after first contact, an indictment on the Bills’ poor tackling, which was confirmed by Pro Football Focus as it had the Bills with 12 missed tackles.
“We’re just not getting the job done right now,” said linebacker Tremaine Edmunds, who made a game-high 12 tackles, though almost all of them were well downfield. “Whatever that is, we have to get back in the film room and practice and we have to fix it. Teams are going to continue to attack us that way if we’re not stopping it. We just have to get better with it.”