Is the Kansas City Chiefs defense broken?

[kcchief4lif 910]

After the Kansas City Chiefs loss to the Denver Broncos in Week 2, I said that the Chiefs defense looks better this year. Oops. That was ... not right. The Chiefs have given up 31, 38 and 36 points in the past three weeks.

So is the Chiefs defense broken? This is their worst three-game stretch since Andy Reid took over.

A few of the problems a non-expert like me has been seeing:

• If they don't get pressure on the quarterback, it's over. That's true of a lot of teams but we watch the Chiefs every week so we see it.
  
• Injuries are hurting them at whoever lines up as the third cornerback. The first three weeks, it was because Sean Smith was out. Last week, it was because Phillip Gaines was out. Gaines is out for the year so this problem isn't going anywhere.
  
• The Chiefs are giving up too many big plays down the field. Andy Dalton fumbling the snap and launching one deep to AJ Green (he completed it) is one I'm thinking of.
  
• Teams can force the Chiefs into their nickel defense and then run on them at a pretty good clip. They changed their defensive alignment against Cincinnati in those situations but it didn't help.
  
• The Chiefs have played really good quarterbacks in the past two weeks. Aaron Rodgers and Andy Dalton are both MVP candidates a quarter of the way through the season. The problem is, the Chiefs thought they would be at the level where they can compete with those teams.
  

I don't know the answer here but you have to look at Chiefs defensive coordinator Bob Sutton. The Chiefs have a lot of individual talent but they haven't been able to put it together in the past two weeks.

 

http://www.arrowheadpride.com/2015/10/5/9454309/is-the-kansas-city-chiefs-defense-broken

[eraser 722]

In short, YES. 

 

The defense is broke, and that is sad. They should have been considered one of the best in the league this year. Blame part on the loss of Sean Smith at the start of the season, and the loss of Gaines as Smith returns to the team. Did anyone notice a sharp drop off of Sean Smith from last season? I think he peaked last year, and the three game suspension has hurt his career.  The other part can lay at the feet of the coaching staff, mostly Sutton. He apparently cannot lead a defense beyond a written script. Anything else registers DOES NOT COMPUTE. This is an issue. Finally, the team looks like they are playing in the haze of reality. The reality is they will have to ride out a long losing season that was once filled with promise. The players know their goose is cooked, and they are playing as if that reality has sat in. The loss to Denver opened that wound. 

[Guest Okiechief1]

IMO it's pretty simple, the pass rush and even JH masked alot of the defiencies in the secondary. When we got after the QB the way we did it made their job much easier, now that the pass rush has virtually disappeared the last 2 games they are being asked to cover more than they have had to in the past. I never bought into the secondary being as good as it was made out to be last year because of that but I also didn't expect the pass rush to be non existent either.

 

The run D even with DJ was never really that good. We haven't had a good solid run D in years. That also helped the pass D look better than what it was. Teams could run on us when they wanted so their was no need to pass or pass as much.

 

Hali being done along with JH coming back to earth as their was no way he was going to duplicate last year, and their goes the pass rush.

 

I bought into the hype as much as anybody, but last year was more the perfect storm to make things look better than they really were.

[KCSLC2008 606]

I had someone trying to convince me it was the offense's fault. When the other team scores two touchdowns on their first two drives and there's a seven minute offense drive in the middle of those two, I can't really say the defense wasn't rested. Offense has its problems, but the defense's problems are their own, not due to lack of rest.

 

When 7 drives end in field goals, that means the offense least drove that far and burn the clock. It also means there weren't very many short fields for the defenses, the Kelce fumble notwithstanding. We obviously did not convert all of our third downs, but seven of them were field goals not punts.

[liquidfriend 1,151]

Sutton was exposed long ago, but Dontari Poe and Justin Houston masked his deficiencies.

 

Poe isn't the same player right now, so those problems can't be masked.

[DieHard 2,061]

We had a a couple blastings from really good offenses.  But if we don't get pressure we are going to get killed in his man-to-man. 

We just have to get pressure.  Hali has 1 sack.  Dee Ford has none.  We can throw stones at Sutton all we want, but the players have to play.

 

I expect it to get better, but it will need to get alot better to have the kind of D we enjoyed last year.  No more clean pockets.

[liquidfriend 1,151]

It kinda goes hand in hand. Can't rack up sacks when a QB can launch it quickly because the coverage sucks and your old slower OLB is trying to cover unsuccessfully.