The Chiefs walked out of Sunday’s 24-21 loss to the Broncos with the kind of ending that lingers. Kansas City had a chance to steal it at the goal line, but the final sequence turned into a mess of pressure, traffic, and missed timing - and it put the team’s wide receiver situation under the microscope all over again.
What should have been a game-winning touchdown to Rashee Rice got wiped out by a false start on Jaylon Moore, pushing the offense back five yards. From there, Patrick Mahomes was sacked from six yards out, and the Chiefs never got another shot.
The protection broke down, sure. But the bigger issue was what the route tree looked like when the play unfolded.
Nobody really separated. Xavier Worthy came in motion from right to left, with Travis Kelce and Kenneth Walker flowing to that side as well, but the Broncos closed the space fast.
Mahomes would have needed to loft a corner route to Worthy, while Walker would have had to fight through contact underneath just to create a chance. Kelce had little room against a Broncos linebacker, and even the route that might have opened with more improvisation still looked crowded and slow to develop.
On the other side, Rice and Andrew Armstrong were working toward the end zone, but that didn’t create much of anything either. Rice drifted into the middle of the end zone while Armstrong headed for the back right corner, only to find two defenders sitting on him.
Rice, meanwhile, was tangled up in traffic. The whole thing looked stuck before Mahomes even had a real window.
That final snap said plenty about where this passing game is right now. Denver’s secondary is excellent, but Kansas City also doesn’t have a group of receivers who consistently win with sharp route running or in tight, contested spaces. Against a good defense, that becomes a problem fast.
There were other moments that fit the same theme. Mahomes took a deep shot to Cyrus Allen that just missed, and J.J.
Watt noted on the broadcast that Allen slowed down on the route. If he keeps running, the Chiefs may have had a shot at a long touchdown.
Worthy had his own issues too. He didn’t create separation on the final play, and there were other snaps where he seemed to miss chances to move the chains or catch the ball with room to work.
On one sideline throw, Mahomes put the ball behind him, apparently expecting a curl, stop, or comeback route. It wasn’t the first time this season that Worthy and Mahomes looked out of sync, with the quarterback delivering the ball underneath the coverage while the receiver kept running.
That kind of miscommunication has shown up enough to become hard to ignore.
With the trade deadline approaching, the Chiefs are already in the rumor mill for wide receiver help. After a loss like this, that chatter only gets louder. Kansas City does not have much time left, and given the rest of the roster, standing pat with a pass-catching group that keeps showing these same flaws would be a tough sell.
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Caitlin Clark Just Weighed In On The Ultimate Chiefs Debate
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The conversation naturally drifted into the kind of debate Chiefs fans love most: favorites, eras and the players who defined them. Clark singled out Travis Kelce as her top choice among all-time Chiefs, while also giving plenty of respect to names like Tony Gonzalez and Patrick Mahomes. She also had positive things to say about how the team has looked this season, which is exactly the sort of outside perspective Kansas City fans will happily take while the bigger conversation around the roster keeps rolling. [Read more 🡒]
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The latest example came against Denver, where Kansas City got more production through an unexpected source than from the player built to stretch the field. Johnson led the Chiefs in receiving yards and found the end zone, while Worthy was held to a quiet afternoon, leaving the team still waiting for the deep-ball impact that was supposed to be part of his calling card. [Read more 🡒]
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The bigger roster questions, though, are the ones fans will keep watching in the coming days. Reids comments pointed to movement at left guard, where Kingsley Suamataia looks positioned to get another shot in the lineup, while general manager Brett Veach continues to monitor the market ahead of the November 10 trade deadline. With the Chiefs trying to steady things in the middle of the season, the next decisions could shape both the immediate lineup and whatever help might still be on the way. [Read more 🡒]