NEW ORLEANS — It’s a mark of a blowout that the recipients are often unemotional, aware from early in the game that they were so overwhelmed they had no chance. The Kansas City Chiefs had already had hours to begin to process how the Philadelphia Eagles had manhandled them in a 40-22 Super Bowl loss that was far more lopsided than that score indicates.
By the time it was over, the three-peat was already an afterthought, so far out of reach on Sunday that it was barely worth mentioning again and certainly not worth mourning. All Super Bowl losses are painful — they feel worse than the wins feel good, Patrick Mahomes explained — but this one was so complete that the Chiefs had already moved on to talking about how they would use the defeat to motivate them next season and about what they could learn from a game in which they were dominated on both lines of scrimmage.
“They played really good up front and really good on the back end, and we just couldn’t figure it out,” said Chiefs rookie wide receiver Xavier Worthy, who scored two touchdowns.
That just about sums it up. The irony of this loss for the Chiefs is that the Eagles beat them using the formula that Andy Reid himself taught Philadelphia general manager Howie Roseman. Reid, a former offensive lineman, believes in building teams through the trenches. Roseman, one of his disciples, followed the formula and constructed a defense that sacked Mahomes six times and hit him 11 times, despite not blitzing. That allowed the defense to stay back. The Eagles intercepted Mahomes twice — one returned for a touchdown by rookie corner Cooper DeJean, the other snagged by linebacker Zack Baun (whom Roseman signed to a one-year contract last offseason), setting the Eagles up for the touchdown that gave them a 24-point lead in the second quarter.
Mahomes said he would take more ownership of this loss than any other game in his career. He put the team in a bad spot, he thought, and despite all the times he pulled the Chiefs out of bad spots this season during their string of one-score victories, Mahomes felt he did not play to his standards this year, especially when he struggled early on. The quarterback said he would spend the offseason figuring out how to beat what defenses are doing to him.
“When defenses are going to stay back, I can’t make bad plays worse,” he said. “Sometimes I get to where I want to make a big play to spark us.”
He added that he needed to learn to throw the ball away. And until he shows he will take what a defense will give him, they will continue to play back.
“They were going to make me be a fundamental quarterback,” Mahomes said. “Play from the pocket and take what they’ll give me. In order to make a team blitz, you have to beat what they’re showing.”
The reality for the Chiefs, of course, is that what most would help Mahomes is putting together a more effective offensive line. Even during this portion of the Chiefs dynasty, the offensive line has been a consistent concern, and it was overmatched against the Eagles’ front. On Sunday, Philly could pressure with just four rushers. The most critical sequence for Kansas City occurred midway through the second quarter. Already trailing 10-0, the Chiefs gave up consecutive sacks to Josh Sweat and to Sweat and Jalyx Hunt together. Facing third-and-16, Mahomes tried to put the ball into a tight window for DeAndre Hopkins. DeJean stepped in front of it and was off, headed for a touchdown.
“No, they didn’t show any different looks,” said Chiefs center Creed Humphrey. “They didn’t show anything un-scouted. It just came down to them coming out and playing harder.”
It was Humphrey who said it was never about the three-peat for him. Each team is different and he wanted to win one for this group.
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Much of Kansas City’s campaign had seemed like it existed on the razor’s edge because the Chiefs played so many close games, but it also felt charmed, because they won so many of them. In the Eagles, the Chiefs faced a foe with a physicality to easily shove them off the edge. If the Chiefs are to rebound and continue their AFC dominance, they likely will have to construct a line that looks more like the Eagles’ — which is simply immense, and which allowed just two sacks of Jalen Hurts on Sunday and powered a dominant rushing attack all season.
“We need to step up and not let this feeling get lost,” Humphrey said. “Make sure we feel this throughout the offseason and come back better.”
This iteration of the Chiefs may be changing dramatically. Tight end Travis Kelce, who spoke briefly with reporters at his locker after the game, could ponder retirement, creating a seismic shift in how Mahomes functions. Even for an offense as gifted as the Chiefs’, which looks so well-prepared and well-deployed so often, it can run into a buzzsaw. On Sunday, that was the Eagles, a team built to Reid’s specifications, which Reid must now try to match.
“It happens,” Reid said.