Kansas City Chiefs need to lean on run game against Packers

The Kansas City Chiefs host the Green Bay Packers on Sunday Night Football and with no Patrick Mahomes under center, it’s even more critical that the Chiefs lean on the run and stick with it throughout the game.

It’s always tough losing your quarterback to injury, but for the Kansas City Chiefs, it’s brutal. Patrick Mahomes is the reason why many penciled the Chiefs in for a second straight AFC Championship appearance this year and his injury, no matter how many games he misses, could strongly effect the Chiefs’ Super Bowl hopes.

In their (likely) first game without Mahomes, the Chiefs turn to backup Matt Moore, who fans got to see through three quarters in the Thursday night game against Denver last week. Moore was rusty at first, but figured things out as the game kept going, finishing with 117 yards off of ten completions and a touchdown pass.

As decent as Moore looked in the second half of that game, the Packers are a much better team than the Broncos are. They’ll actually be able to put up points on Kansas City’s defense (like most teams have been able to) and their defense is better than Denver’s as well.

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This means the Chiefs run game, which has been invisible over the last three games, needs to up the ante for Kansas City to have any chance to win this game.

Here are the amount of carries and yards the Chiefs rushing attack has had throughout the season and the result of that game:

• Week 1 at Jaguars – 26 carries, 113 yards (Won 40-26)
• Week 2 at Raiders – 22 carries, 31 yards (Won 28-10)
• Week 3 vs Ravens – 25 carries, 140 yards (Won 33-28)
• Week 4 at Lions – 25 carries, 123 yards (Won 34-30)
• Week 5 vs Colts – 14 carries, 36 yards (Lost 19-13)
• Week 6 vs Texans – 11 carries, 53 yards (Lost 31-24)
• Week 7 at Broncos – 27 carries, 80 yards (Won 30-6)

The Chiefs are 3-0 when their running backs total 100+ yards and in the two games that they lost, they completely gave up on running the ball. They can’t do that against the Packers even if Green Bay gets off to a commanding lead.

As bad as the Chiefs are at stopping the run, Green Bay’s defense is just as bad at it. They rank as the ninth worst run defense in the league, allowing an average of 128.9 rushing yards per game. They had no answer to stopping Joshua Jacobs last week and if the Raiders hadn’t gotten in their own way, Oakland could have just kept handing off to Jacobs and been able to keep that game close.

Andy Reid has abandoned the run on a few occasions this year, but that’s easier to do when Patrick Mahomes is taking the snaps. Matt Moore doesn’t provide that same talent at quarterback, making it even more important that Reid sticks with the run and leans on it a little more than the Chiefs have this year.

The Chiefs have opted to go with the running back by committee approach and even with that being the case, LeSean McCoy has been the leading carrier in most of, if not all of the Chiefs’ games thus far. His best game came in week one when he carried the rock ten times for 81 yards.

Shady needs to get involved in the game plan, as does Damien Williams and Darrel Williams. Damien has been a disappointment this season, but if there’s ever going to be a time for him to step up and show he was worth the extension he received last year, it’s now.

Kansas City might be playing from behind a lot on Sunday, but the Packers have shown an inability to stop the run and that needs to be a strong part of the Chiefs’ offensive game plan come Sunday night.