Quote:
Originally Posted by DJ's left nut
I think 'okay' is a more than fair assessment. I mean if we were talking about Smith, we'd barbecue him for forcing the 2nd pick and overheating the 1st. We'd point out that 2 of his biggest plays were almost exclusively YAC yards to Watkins (designed screenish sort of thing) and Kelce (an unreal cutback on Barry Church). We'd note that he had some very indecisive looks in the red-zone and was clearly not quite ready for the speed of the Jags defense being able to close up those passing lanes in tight spaces. We would have absolutely crushed him for coming off Hill early a time or two (when he was getting separation from coverage) and definitely for underthrowing that deep pass early.
I mean the scoreboard says this game was a blowout but this game felt a shitload closer than the Chargers and Niners game. Frankly, the Steelers game seemed far more dominant as well.
If the Jags come back here in January, Bortles probably isn't throwing 3 interceptions in the end zone (with the 4th being a pick six on a screen). Marrone probably isn't throwing twice at 3rd and 2 after running the ball all the way down inside the 5. There were a half dozen different potential turning points in that game and they ALL went KC's way. If we face them again, Mahomes needs to be better than he was yesterday.
He didn't play poorly. He made some huge plays that we badly needed at the time. The good outweighed the bad by a fair amount. But I'm hopeful that he is able to play better against them should we face them again because I'm pretty sure we'll need him to.
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He will play better, but I don’t think you are giving him fair credit for some of those drives. Jags put KC in bad field position repeatedly. Every time Mahomes responded by marching down the field. It would be so easy against that defense to go 3 and out, fumble, or pick 6 deep in your own territory, especially for a very young QB. His QBR in the game was over 72. Compare that with Darnold’s 15 QBR against that same defense.