Kansas City Chiefs: Pass rush not as lethal without Chris Jones
The inactives have been announced for the Kansas City Chiefs’ Divisional Round game against the Houston Texans and Chris Jones’ name appeared on the list. This is bad news for the pass rush.
Despite the Kansas City Chiefs being heavy favorites in this game, Chris Jones being on the sideline could be a major factor in the outcome of this game. The Chiefs didn’t have Jones in the first match-up against the Texans and they lost that one and a lot has changed since then, but it is worth noting.
Early in the season when Jones had missed time, Frank Clark was still struggling to do much of anything. While he came to life in the second half of the season, a lot of that was due to Jones being on the field and teams shifting their attention to attempting to stop him.
The Kansas City pass rush was great down the stretch, yes, but that was because both Jones and Clark were on the field making an impact; Remove one of them from that unit and it could be much tougher to make an impact in the pass rush.
Here are the #Chiefs’ seven inactives for today’s game vs #Texans:
— Chiefs Reporter (@ChiefsReporter) January 12, 2020
CB Morris Claiborne
DL Chris Jones
OL Jackson Barton
QB Chad Henne
OL Andrew Wylie
OL Ryan Hunter
LB Darron Lee
The good news is that Houston’s offensive line is absolutely terrible, allowing seven sacks on Deshaun Watson a week ago when they faced the Bills in the Wild Card round. The last time Watson wasn’t sacked once in a game was in that week six game against the Chiefs.
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Jones was going to be a huge difference maker this time around, but now, it’ll be up to Frank Clark to make the most noise when it comes to pressuring the quarterback. Hopefully Steve Spagnuolo can dial up some pressure and get guys like Tanoh Kpassagnon, Khalen Saunders, and even Tyrann Mathieu involved in getting after Watson because that’s a big key to winning this game for Kansas City. They HAVE to pressure Watson.
Not having Jones is unfortunate, but the Chiefs are still the better football team. They didn’t have Jones in week six and really should have won that game. This time around, this team knows what they’ll have to do to beat the Texans and hitting Watson is still a big part of that, even without Chris Jones on the field.
Next. Getting to Know Houston Texans Before Divisional Round. dark
Time to take it to the Texans and hit Deshaun Watson all afternoon long.