The Kansas City Chiefs moved to 6-5 with a 23-20 overtime win against the Indianapolis Colts. Andy Reid’s team trailed by 11 points in the fourth quarter but tied the game at the end of regulation with a Harrison Butker field goal, before Kansas City’s kicker won the game in overtime with another chip-shot attempt. The win means the Chiefs avoided falling to 5-6, a record that would have been tough to come back from as they continue their hunt for a spot in the postseason. It is not hyperbole to say that Kansas City saved their season with this win, and just when the rest of the NFL thought the reigning AFC Champions were done, the Chiefs have shown that the nerves around the league of another Super Bowl appearance from Patrick Mahomes, have increased greatly.
2025 has been the worst season of the Mahomes era, particularly record wise. At 6-5, the Chiefs will most likely not win their division for the first time since 2015. However, they still have a real chance at a wildcard spot. The 2025 Chiefs may have a poor record for their standards but there is a lot to suggest that this is a better team than the 2024 addition of the side, when they were the number one seed in the AFC.
In 2024, the Chiefs went 15-2 in the regular season, with one of those losses being in week 18 when they rested starters against the Denver Broncos. That team also went all the way to the Super Bowl, however, there is an argument to be made that this year’s team is better, despite the record. In 2025, the Kansas City Chiefs are fifth in total offense, ninth in scoring offense, sixth in total defense and fourth scoring defense. The only other team in the NFL who rank top ten in all of those categories are the Los Angeles Rams, who of course aren’t in the Chiefs’ conference, and are also regarded by most as the best team in the NFL. The 2024 Chiefs, who won the AFC Championship for a third straight year, ranked 17th in total offense and 15th in scoring offense during the regular season, significantly worse than this team in comparison to the rest of the league. While in 2024, the Chiefs’ defense ranked ninth in total yards against and fourth in scoring defense, those rankings are still worse or tied with the 2025 version of the team.
The 2025 Chiefs have not looked like a Super Bowl contender this season, but what team has? We have seen the Chiefs be disappointing for their standards in the regular season before and go on to win the Super Bowl. In 2024, despite their 15-2 record, most would agree that the Chiefs were not at the same standard in the regular season as they usually are but they still won the AFC as they turned up in the playoffs when it mattered. In 2023, Kansas City ended up as the number three seed with an 11-6 record yet still won the Super Bowl after Patrick Mahomes’ team defeated the Buffalo Bills and the Baltimore Ravens on the road. The fact is, no matter the regular season, this team performs in the playoffs.
2023 and 2024 saw Patrick Mahomes have the worst two seasons of his career, but in the playoffs he stepped up as he always does. In the 2023 regular season, Mahomes had a touchdown to interception ratio of less than two, with a passer rating of 92.6 over the season. In the playoffs, his touchdown to interception ratio was six, and his passer rating jumped to 100.3 as he claimed his third Super Bowl MVP. In 2024, Mahomes had a 93.5 passer rating in the regular season. While he was admittedly bad in the Super Bowl against the Philadelphia Eagles, he had a passer rating of 105.5 in the AFC playoffs, and even if you include his disappointing Super Bowl performance, his rating for the postseason was still over 100.
When the 8-2 Colts were winning by 11 points in the fourth quarter against the 5-5 Chiefs, there was a reason everyone in the AFC wanted the Colts to emerge victorious and keep their hunt for the number one seed going, and the reason is Patricm Mahomes. The three-time Super Bowl MVP is second in NFL history in playoff passing touchdowns, having only played seven full seasons, with this being his eighth. He is second all time in playoff passer rating. His playoff touchdown to interception ratio of 4.6 is bettered only by Josh Allen and Bart Starr among quarterbacks who have a minimum of 10 postseason starts. No one wants to face Mahomes in the playoffs. The worst finish he has to a season is overtime of the AFC Championship. The only two objectively bad games of his playoff career came in the 2021 AFC Championship and Super Bowl LIX. The two other powerhouse AFC quarterbacks who should make the playoffs this year are Josh Allen and Lamar Jackson. Mahomes is 4-0 against Allen in the playoffs, and the one time he faced Jackson, Mahomes defeated his fellow two-time MVP winner in Jackson’s house.
The Chiefs’ record this season could very easily be flipped to 8-3. Mahomes had a pass intercepted at the goal-line after a drop from Travis Kelce against the Eagles in a 20-17 loss. He also threw a 99-yard pick six to Devin Lloyd in a 31-28 loss to the Jacksonville Jaguars. Of course, those were mistakes made by the Chiefs which contributed to their losses, and you could play the ifs, buts and maybes game with any team in the league. However, the fine margins show that this is not a fundamentally bad team and, more importantly, the Chiefs rarely make those mistakes in the playoffs, and if they do, such as Mecole Hardman’s goal-line fumble against the Bills in the 2023/24 playoffs, they recover from it, especially in the AFC side of the postseason. That is why no team in the AFC wants the Chiefs to make the playoffs, they are an efficient machine when it is crunch time.
The Colts had a chance to end Kansas City’s season. Now that they haven’t, the prospect of the Chiefs making the playoffs seems more likely than ever in 2025. If you were to ask any AFC contender who they would least like to face in the playoffs this year, they would all give the same answer, the team that has won the conference the last three seasons, even if they got to face them at home. The Colts missed their chance to kill off the AFC champions, now Kansas City’s remaining opponents need to make sure they don’t make the same mistake, otherwise the greatest postseason quarterback of all time will be waiting as he looks to make his fourth straight Super Bowl.
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