TNF Fallout: Chiefs Give Raiders First Win Of Season

The Kansas City Chiefs may be able to shake off their 24-20 loss to the Oakland Raiders by telling themselves it was a game that did not really matter.

They still sit in second place only in the AFC West, only one game behind the Denver Broncos and still have a good enough record to make an eventual playoff run. However, to the sports world the loss mattered big time, and it is something that is going to be talked about until Sunday when a new crop of NFL games takes the media’s and fan’s mind off it. Until then the Chiefs are going to have to listen to commentators and read articles about how they are pretenders, and they may even start to believe that themselves.

The Raiders are by no means a good football team, though they have been improving on a weekly basis. They moved to 1-10, and the win was not just their first of the season but also their first in a year.

The total hit the over, but it was already set at a low 42.5. This should have been the first red flag that the Chiefs’ may be in trouble.

The Raiders held the San Diego Chargers to just 13 points last week. The Chiefs primarily rely on their defense to win games and sometimes some last minute offensive bursts. There is only so many times that you can play from behind as the clock winds down in the fourth quarter before you take a loss. This time the Chiefs took a loss.

Kansas City should not be too hard on themselves, though. They do have the best defense in the NFL, but the loss should also force them to look in the mirror and address their offense, because winning off of fourth-quarter, last-minute drives every game is not a sustainable model for success, and the old saying that “defense wins football games” does not really apply when a team’s offensive strategy is to play as safe as possible and let the  D’ go to work. You got to put points on the board at some point.

Kansas City needs to reassess their offense before they run into the Broncos and Arizona Cardinals, because if they do not you will see all their weaknesses on display again.