Three Questions That Will Define Kansas City Chiefs In 2022

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The Kansas City Chiefs have largely been surrounded by high expectations. That will certainly be the case when you have a quarterback-head coach combo like Patrick Mahomes and Andy Reid. Elsewhere, top players like Travis Kelce, Chris Jones and the budding offensive linemen give Chiefs fans hope. This season is surrounded by a bit of a different feeling, however.

Kansas City will no longer have players like Tyreek Hill or Tyrann Mathieu to lean on in specific spots. Meanwhile, the AFC West division is arguably the strongest in all of the NFL entering 2022. The entire AFC is loaded with young talent and Super Bowl contenders, to boot.

Beyond that, the Chiefs are faced with more roster questions. A sort of anxiousness remains, as the team waits to see the new additions fully come together. The defense is mostly full of younger pieces that are looking to build a new core. With those items in mind, here are three questions about the Kansas City Chiefs that will ultimately define their 2022 season. Let’s kick it off.

Can The Wide Receiver Room Be Trusted?

The Chiefs are littered with plenty of new faces at the wide receiver position. Inserted now are JuJu Smith-Schuster, Marquez Valdes-Scantling and rookie Skyy Moore to potentially round out the top four with Mecole Hardman. There are some other hopefuls looking to stick on the roster. For instance, there are different levels of intrigue surrounding Josh Gordon, Justyn Ross and Justin Watson.

The biggest question surrounding this group, is can they continually be trusted? Mahomes has the ability to create so much on his own to get the passing game rolling. At the same time, defenses have begun to find holes in Kansas City’s armor when little adjustments are being made. You could likely argue that this is a much more balanced set of wide receivers than what the Chiefs had last season. At least on paper, the potential makeup is rather robust, in terms of the amount of wide receivers that could hold a steady presence.

In order for the Chiefs to trust this group, the wide receivers have to work cohesively. There were times where that was not occurring for the offense in the past. Hence the up and down results against certain defensive looks. Moreover, this group is generally filled with players who have chips on their shoulders or are looking to prove themselves. Sticking to their individual roles could help open up the offense for the wide receivers and the Chiefs as a whole.

Will Pass Rush Be Able To Create Consistent Pressure?

The Chiefs felt like they were mostly non-existent when it came to applying pressure last season. It came in spurts for many of the players on the defensive line. Arguably, no one made a bigger impact than Melvin Ingram. He not only helped his own numbers after coming over in a trade from Pittsburgh. Yet, Ingram helped to create more opportunities elsewhere for guys like Jones or Frank Clark.

Looking further at last year’s numbers, Jones led the team in pressures and Clark ranked second on the team. That may sound nice originally, as each player holds definite expectations throughout each season. Nonetheless, Jones’ pressure percentage was down compared to the season before. Clark was right around his same pressure percentage from the two seasons prior. Yet, he was only serviceable for about half of the season, from a pass rush output. Other names like Tershawn Wharton and Mike Danna had slight impacts. Though, neither was fully unleashed nor were they expected to be consistent contributors.

When looking further into this particular question, it is fair to wonder if the Chiefs added enough depth to the pass rush this offseason. George Karlaftis should immediately step in as a day one starter during his rookie season. Other depth options like Joshua Kaindoh or Taylor Stallworth could stand out as occasional rotational pieces. But, that may not put enough confidence in fans initially. The Chiefs defense can dial up blitzes tremendously at crucial moments, due to Steve Spagnuolo alone. Getting home is a different story. If Kansas City continues to fail in that department, it will be a long offseason for some veteran pass rush options.

Does New-Look Secondary Create Air-Tight Scoring Defense?

New Faces

For those that may have forgot, the Chiefs used a total of 10 draft selections this past April. That is the most that the team has used in one draft since Brett Veach became the general manager. As a reminder, the Chiefs used five of those 10 selections on defensive backs. Kansas City clearly believes that many of the guys can produce or compete right away. Specifically, rookie first-round pick Trent McDuffie is likely going to be a day one starter. He can play both outside and in the slot.

There is some hope for improvement from a couple of other top defensive backs. One was on the Chiefs last year. That would be L’Jarius Sneed. The overall numbers were still solid for the Louisiana Tech product. Overall, quarterbacks had a better completion percentage against him last season. Sneed also gave up more yards per completion and yards per target in his second season than he did as a rookie. A slight bounce back could do wonders for the Chiefs defense.

On the other hand, newcomer Justin Reid is tailor-made for Spagnuolo’s defense. His versatility, physicality and instincts fit the game plan to a tee. He takes pride in being a leader and protecting the defense from giving up explosive plays over the top. With a fresh start in Kansas City, the Chiefs believe that the best is yet to come for Reid.

Mahomes’ Mendoza Line

In each of the last two seasons, the Chiefs have held scoring defenses in the top 10 of the NFL. They ranked eighth last season, allowing an average of 21.4 points per game. Most of the team’s winning streak in the second half of the season was created by a fabulous mark in the points allowed department. Can that happen once again? We know the numbers when the team has allowed too many points with Mahomes at quarterback. The Chiefs are actually 39-2 all-time with the quarterback when allowing less than 28 points. If the defense and the secondary can average a little less than that or better, KC will likely stay ahead of the eight ball in a challenging AFC.

Be on the lookout for more FPC Chiefs articles in the coming days. For more great sports and NFL content, stay tuned to Full Press Coverage.

– Braden Holecek is the Kansas City Chiefs managing editor for Full Press Coverage. He covers the NFL. Like and follow on Follow @ebearcat9//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js Follow @FPC_Chiefs//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js and Facebook.