A Look Back at Last Year's AFC Championship Game: Chiefs Offense vs. Bengals Defense

Patrick Mahomes is known for his ability to make second-reaction plays. His legs are obviously a big part of that. So the health of his ankle will be something to watch closely this Sunday in the AFC Championship Game.

That being said, limited movement might not be the worst thing for Mahomes.

In fact, while he might be the best in the NFL at making big plays off of the scramble, he is also at his worst when he’s too quick to resort to “Sandlot” football. When he gets into that mode, he’ll sometimes flee the pocket before it’s necessary, which leads to some of those great Andy-Reid-designed big plays being left on the field. This was actually one of the key reasons why the Chiefs were shut down in the second half and overtime of last year’s AFC Championship Game against Cincinnati.

Regardless of his health, Mahomes will need to play a more disciplined game to get past the Bengals on Sunday. Titles are still won from the pocket.

With that in mind, it’s worth taking another look at how Lou Anarumo’s defense handled Mahomes and the Chiefs offense in the 2021 AFC Championship game. Our breakdown from last January is below:

Adjustments by Bengals Defense, Miscues by Chiefs Offense Lead to Improbable Upset

Years from now, the Chiefs will look back on each of their heart-breaking postseason losses during the Mahomes-Reid era, and this one will stand out as the most painful.

This was a largely self-inflicted missed opportunity. Kansas City was on the verge of a 3rd straight Super Bowl appearance after taking an early 21-3 lead that seemed completely insurmountable for the young and inexperienced Bengals. Between some sloppy play by Patrick Mahomes and some key adjustments by the Bengals defense, the Chiefs were shut down after halftime. Cincinnati is headed to L.A. for the Super Bowl as a result.

What did the Bengals defense do differently?

It’s not fair to say that this game ONLY come down to the Chiefs missing an opportunity. The Bengals defense deserves a ton of credit too, especially after defensive coordinator Lou Anarumo took a different approach in the second half that gave Mahomes and K.C. problems.

There were two key differences to Anarumo’s approach in the final 30 minutes and overtime. First, he focused more on taking away the middle of the field with coverage. That helped eliminate some of those deep over routes that the Chiefs rely on so often to create explosive plays.

Second, he rushed 3 more often. Sometimes that extra defender was used in coverage to take away any shallow crossing routes. Other times, he was used as a spy to keep Mahomes from effectively fleeing the pocket to make plays with his legs.

The below 3rd down was a great example. You can see the matchups and concept illustrated. The Bengals would rush 3 and play cover-1 (man-free). However, they ended up with 3 help defenders in the middle of the field: The deep safety over the top, a safety at the intermediate level to handle any in-breaking routes, and another safety (the extra body in coverage as a result of only rushing 3) acting as a hole defender underneath to help out on any shallow crossers:

As a part of this concept, multiple man-coverage defenders would trade off their receivers running routes over the middle and then drop off to become inside help defenders.

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On this play, you can see Eli Apple pass off Demarcus Robinson’s shallow crosser to safety Jessie Bates in the middle, who cut Robinson’s route:

Apple then replaced Bates inside and provided help on Travis Kelce, coming from the other side of the formation:

A similar thing occured at the next level with Tyreek Hill’s route:

That’s a lot of clutter in the middle of the field with both Tyreek Hill and Travis Kelce accounted for by multiple defenders:

The definition of a coverage sack…

Mahomes’ 3rd-down interception in overtime came against a similar look. Here, the Bengals would again rush 3. This time, however, they’d use that extra defender as a spy on Mahomes to try and keep him in the pocket.

Behind it, they would play a similar coverage as the previous play with safety Von Bell creeping down into the middle of the field after the snap to handle any intermediate-inbreaking routes: