Thursday night’s clash between Patrick Mahomes and the Broncos defense seemed like a mismatch on paper, but it didn’t turn into a rout at Arrowhead Stadium.
While the Chiefs won to move to 5-1 on the season, the postgame reaction was mostly about how much room the team feels it has to improve. They made five trips into the red zone against a struggling Broncos defense, but only turned one of them into a touchdown.
That led head coach Andy Reid to say they “strive for something better than what we’re doing right now” and quarterback Patrick Mahomes credited the defense with carrying the team to a victory.
“Luckily for us, our defense is playing great so we can go through these growing pains and try to get better and better,” Mahomes said. “The talent is there. You can see it in spurts, but we have to learn how to sustain drives. Getting down to the red zone, score touchdowns and make it easier on our defense to play a little bit more free.”
Mahomes said that the Chiefs offense has “built our identity through the season” in past years and that they are doing that now, especially when it comes to who will be the wide receivers the team can count on to get the ball into the end zone. Winning games while they figure that out is a testament to the quality of the Chiefs roster, but it’s certainly a process that the team would like to jumpstart if at all possible in the coming weeks.
