Kansas City Chiefs: Patrick Mahomes Is Exceeding Expectations Early

The Kansas City Chiefs pulled off another upset beating the Pittsburgh Steelers. That came with Patrick Mahomes exceeding expectations to start the season.

As a first-round pick, there is a lot of expectations put on you. If you are a top ten pick, the expectations, and pressure rise more. When you are a quarterback, that adds a lot of pressure. When Kansas City Chiefs head coach Andy Reid, one of the best offensives minds in the game of football, tells you that he wants you to lead his team, that adds a tremendous amount of pressure. That is where Patrick Mahomes is and has been the last two years.

Year one was all about learning from Alex Smith. Being the backup QB can have it’s advantages, but it adds more pressure. You never know when the player above you on the depth chart will get injured.

You know that you have to be ready. You also know in your first appearance you have to impress. In Week 17, Mahomes got his first time to shine under Andy Reid. He was anxious, and that showed with his early interception. He calmed down and led the Chiefs to a victory that day.

Now it’s year two for Mahomes. Smith and Offensive Coordinator Matt Nagy are gone. Now the spotlight is on Mahomes. So far it looks like he is up to the challenge. For what is essentially Mahomes’s “rookie year”, so far he does not look like a rookie.

He is calm while going through his reads. He is not succumbing to phantom pressure (When the Qb thinks a defender is about to close in, but no one is there) very much.

He is not ditching the pocket immediately. He looks like a veteran pocket passer. He is even doing things Smith wasn’t comfortable doing until his final year in Kansas City. He is extending plays and keeping his eyes downfield. He is taking risks that Smith would not dream of. He is looking elite. He is surpassing expectations.

Before the season began, Seth Keysor of the Athletic went to the people of Twitter with a question:

 
A lot of Twitter followers answered. These were just some of the replies:

Those are only some of the results. So far Mahomes is exceeding all of these expectations and more. According to ESPN.com so far in 2018 (keep in mind they have only played two games) Mahomes has 528 yards,0 interceptions, a 68.85 completion percentage, and 10 touchdowns.

More from Patrick Mahomes

• The Chiefs Divisional Parlay Bet to Lock in Right Now
• WATCH: Patrick Mahomes Throws Absurdly Accurate Behind-The-Back Pass
• What Chiefs Players Will Be on Next Year’s NFL Top 100?
• It’s Time to Bet Patrick Mahomes to Win MVP
• Patrick Mahomes is Officially the Most Underpaid Athlete in the World

For a side by side comparison, I did some math. The expectations at this point is for Mahomes to have 532 yards, a 65% completion percentage, 2 touchdowns, and an interception. Now some of Mahomes’s numbers are just under the mark.

For instance, he is 4 yards short of the expected yardage, but he makes up for that with having 5 times the amount of touchdowns. He is 3% over the expected completion percentage, and under the interception amounts.

He did all of this with facing decent, if not good NFL defenses in L.A. and Pittsburgh.

For a second, I just want to focus on the touchdowns. In the Pittsburgh game Mahomes threw 6 touchdowns. According to Pro Football Reference the NFL record is 7 passing touchdowns in one game. Only 8 Qbs have that record and of that group only Nick Foles, and Drew Brees are still playing.

Mahomes almost tied the record, on a GOOD defense. His 10 touchdowns in the first two weeks of the season are not only a Chiefs franchise record, but that is an NFL record as verified by the Kansas City Chiefs Twitter Account. That is only on the field stuff.

Patrick Mahomes can be seen on the sidelines after a score hi-fiving his teammates, and looking at the tablets to see where he was wrong after a drive did not go well. Mahomes has shown leadership by texting the position groups and working with them at different times this off-season.

NBC’s Pro Football Talk even talks about that here.  The biggest drawbacks with Mahomes when he first came to the Chiefs was footwork, and that he wasn’t super comfortable being under the Center.

There have only been 2 snaps so far where you could see that surface. This is a sign that Mahomes is improving his game while being a leader to his teammates. Mahomes was everything we expected and even more.