Patrick Mahomes finds swagger, passes Chiefs to AFC West lead

Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes can’t remember exactly when he watched the video. Either Monday or Tuesday in the quarterbacks room at Kansas City’s practice facility.

But it left an impression on the affable 26-year-old and powered yet another virtuoso outing.

“(Rookie third-string quarterback) Shane Buechele came up to me and showed me this video of this kid, and he was saying, ‘I got my swagger back,’” Mahomes said. “That was like the mojo, the video of the week. … I was like, ‘Man, that’s what we’re going to do on Sunday.’”

Mahomes definitely found his mojo Sunday night in a 41-14 victory over the Raiders at Allegiant Stadium, completing 35 of 50 passes for 406 yards, five touchdowns and a quarterback rating of 127.6. He didn’t throw an interception for the second consecutive week after throwing at least one in the previous seven games.

In short, he’s back, and the AFC West is on notice.

“You knew he was going to get through the ups and downs just by the way he handles himself,” Chiefs coach Andy Reid said.

The barometer by which Mahomes is measured is different from the rest of the quarterbacks in the NFL, given the way he played in his first three seasons as Kansas City’s starter. He was the NFL MVP in 2018, a Super Bowl MVP and champion in 2019, and he led the Chiefs to the Super Bowl again last season.

He had won 82 percent of his starts and totaled 114 touchdown passes to 23 interceptions.

So his slow start this season was rather striking. He’s thrown 10 interceptions — two shy of his career high of 12 — and his completion percentage, yards per attempt and passer rating were career lows amid a 5-4 start.

But Mahomes reminded the public — and the Raiders — exactly what he’s capable of. He didn’t force anything down the field and was content to complete safer, shorter passes against Las Vegas’ zone coverage concepts. When big plays presented themselves, though, he pulled the trigger.

Case and point: He broke the pocket on third-and-11 early in the fourth quarter, sprinted toward some open space and fired a pass 38 yards across his body to running back Darrel Williams, who pulled a touchdown from Raiders safety Johnathan Abram’s grasp.

Mahomes wasn’t sacked on 50 dropbacks and wasn’t forced to flea the pocket, resulting in no rushing attempts. Believe it or not, Kansas City is 6-4 and leads the division with seven games to play.

“We obviously hadn’t offensively played the way we’ve wanted to, but we’ve been finding ways to get wins,” Mahomes said. “Guys have just been steady with the process of getting better and better. Pregame, you could feel the energy. And I think guys wanted to be on ‘Sunday Night Football,’ playing in a stadium like this against a team like that.”

Contact reporter Sam Gordon at sgordon@reviewjournal.com. Follow @BySamGordon on Twitter.