How The Chiefs Can Beat The Ravens On Monday Night Football

Quick-Hitters

• The defending-Champion Kansas City Chiefs (2-0) travel to the Baltimore Ravens (2-0) in a star-studded showdown on Monday Night Football. The contest will feature the league’s MVP quarterbacks from the past two seasons, Patrick Mahomes (2018) and Lamar Jackson (2019).

• Kansas City rolled the Houston Texans 34-20 in Week 1, thanks in large part to their sensational rookie Clyde Edwards-Helaire. The Chiefs barely eked out a 23-20 overtime win in Week 2 against the Los Angeles Chargers in the brand new SoFi Stadium.

• The Chiefs defense will need to generate a pass rush without opening up holes for Jackson to burn them with his legs. The top rushing offense of 2019 has so many different weapons and so many options that it can be jarring to execute a strategy to contain them. Kansas City’s best hope will be to consistently feature a four-man rush while not breaking contain. The top target to blanket in coverage should be Ravens tight end Mark Andrews, Jackson’s most talented receiver.

• Baltimore (-170) is favored over Kansas City (+145) with the over/under set at 54.5 total points. The Ravens are 3.5-point favorites. CLICK HERE FOR LIVE GAME ODDS!
  

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Dominating The Trenches

Patrick Mahomes and the Kansas City Chiefs were able to mount a thrilling comeback victory over the San Francisco 49ers in Super Bowl LIV, thanks in large part to the protection afforded by their offensive line. After last week’s near-disastrous tilt with the Los Angeles Chargers, it appears the defending-champs have a tall hill to climb to return to that level of protection for their franchise quarterback.

The Chargers—most notably edge rushers Joey Bosa and Melvin Ingram—were constantly invading the pocket and harassing Mahomes. He never got too comfortable in his drop-backs, had trouble making his reads, and checking his progressions throughout the day proved difficult. To make matters worse, rookie standout running back Clyde Edwards-Helaire struggled to get things going out of the backfield. After an explosive 138 yards and a score in Week 1, CEH only netted 38 rushing yards on 10 carries in Week 2.

If the Chiefs want to return to regular-season dominance and Super Bowl glory this year, they'll have to protect Mahomes’ pocket as well as Edwards-Helaire’s running routes. The Tennessee Titans key to beating the top-seed Baltimore Ravens in the 2019 playoffs was to ram powerful back, Derrick Henry, down the throats of their defense for 195 yards. Nobody’s betting on the rookie to do that to the Ravens in Week 3, but they'll need to establish a consistent run game to afford Mahomes the extra time and space to excel.

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Removing Jackson From Comfort Zone

Defensively, Kansas City has seemed to be one of the only organizations to possess Jackson’s kryptonite. Whereas the 2019 MVP sports an NFL career rating of 110.2 against the other 31 teams, he has only managed a passer rating of 81.3 in two battles with the Chiefs. In their lone meeting last season, he threw for a pedestrian 267 yards on just 22-of-43 passing.

If the Chiefs can once again contain Jackson in the pocket and limit his top receiving threats, they should be in good shape to pull off the upset Monday. Last season, Kansas City held tight end Mark Andrews to three catches for 15 yards, the lowest yards-per-reception rate of his otherwise stellar second-year campaign. Big play rookie receiver Marquise Brown hauled in only 2-of-9 targets, by far his worst catch rate of any game in his 2019 campaign.

The Chiefs must once again aim to neutralize Andrews in the middle of the field and Brown out wide, but they also have to pay close attention to Baltimore's elite running game. The Ravens put up a historic 3,296 ground yards and 21 rushing touchdowns last season, and they'll be looking to gash a vulnerable Chiefs front seven Monday.

Feature backs have fared particularly well against Kansas City so far in this young season. Last week, the Chiefs allowed Chargers dual-threat running backs Austin Ekeler and rookie Joshua Kelley to combine for 261 all-purpose yards on 39 total carries and six total catches. In Week 1, Houston Texans back David Johnson rushed 11 times for 77 yards and a score, including three receptions for 32 yards.

This could spell trouble, as veteran Mark Ingram and rookie J.K. Dobbins will be raring to rip into their rivals in prime time. Last season, Ingram enjoyed 103 rushing yards and three touchdowns in the Ravens 33-28 loss to the Chiefs on September 22nd at Arrowhead Stadium. Baltimore lost again one week later (to the Cleveland Browns), but then finished the season on a 12-game winning streak.

Chiefs Plus Points

For the Chiefs to pull off the road upset in Baltimore on Monday Night Football, they'll have to protect their quarterback and get off to a good start running the ball. They'll also have to contain Jackson and make him beat them through the air while paying particular attention to tight end Andrews and wideout Brown. If Kansas City can execute a more focused offense than they did against the stout defense of the Chargers in Los Angeles last weekend, the scales should tip in favor of the defending champions. Take the underdog Chiefs +3.5 and don’t be surprised if they aren’t listed as underdogs again all season.