Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs can’t keep getting away with this. Or can they?
The Kansas City Chiefs continue to win games that no team should win that often, causing opposing fans to point to everything from dumb luck to favorable refereeing to explain the maddening inevitability.
Mathematically, the Chiefs’ 15-game winning streak in games decided by one score or less should occur once in every 406 chances.
With a 19-17 win over the Los Angeles Chargers on a last-second field goal that bounced off the left wing before going over the crossbar Sunday, the Chiefs became the 26th team in league history to start a season with a record from 12-1.
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Yet they are one of one.
The Chiefs’ point differential over thirteen games (plus-56) is by far the smallest of all 12-1 teams.
The win over the Chargers was Kansas City’s fourth of the season by one or two points, a total that has been exceeded only once over a full season in the NFL’s 105-year history. The 1989 Green Bay Packers did it five times and finished 10-6, according to Pro Football Reference.
How do the Chiefs continue to do this? What is their secret? This particular Kansas City team seems configured to play a lot of close games and win a higher percentage of them, even if its current 15-game winning streak in one-score games remains a mathematical outlier, as we’ll demonstrate next.
What will it mean in the play-offs? There are also indicators to take into account.
The odds behind the streak
The Chiefs have an 18-1 record as of Week 17 of 2023, counting their four-game winning streak for a second straight Super Bowl win. That period includes the 15-game winning streak in games decided by eight or fewer points. The Chiefs also won by 19, 13 and 10 during that span, while suffering their only loss, 30-21, to Buffalo on November 17.
To calculate how likely a team is to win 15 consecutive games of any kind, we take the team’s expected winning percentage in those games to the power of the streak length. Including the playoffs, the Chiefs had a 42-21 (.667) record in one-score games from 2018-2023 with Patrick Mahomes as their starting quarterback. I used this percentage to plot Kansas City’s expected wins in fifteen such games.
The table below shows the probability of a team winning between one and fifteen games in a row, with an expected winning percentage of 67 percent (Mahomes’ winning percentage in one-score games from 2018 to 2023) and 78 percent (his winning percentage in 2023- 2024). .
Win streak probability based on expected win rate
| Games in Streak | 67% win rate | 78% win rate |
|---|---|---|
|
1 |
66.7% |
78.3% |
|
2 |
44.5% |
61.3% |
|
3 |
29.7% |
48.0% |
|
4 |
19.8% |
37.6% |
|
5 |
13.2% |
29.4% |
|
6 |
8.8% |
23.0% |
|
7 |
5.9% |
18.0% |
|
8 |
3.9% |
14.1% |
|
9 |
2.6% |
11.1% |
|
10 |
1.7% |
8.7% |
|
11 |
1.2% |
6.8% |
|
12 |
0.8% |
5.3% |
|
13 |
0.5% |
4.2% |
|
14 |
0.3% |
3.3% |
|
15 |
0.2% |
2.5% |
The microscopic 0.246 percent chance of a 15-game streak in the left column equates to a 1 in 406 chance.
It’s historic. Is it unfathomable?
There are ways to demystify the feat.
The 67 percent winning percentage sets the expectation that the Chiefs would win 10 of these 15 games. In that case, no one would be shocked if they won a few less or a few more. Let’s say they happen to win 12. Add in some one-offs, like Kansas City blocking a last-second field goal against Denver in Week 10, and the remaining three wins could be explained. An unlikely battle here, a lucky penalty there.
But there’s more to it than that.
Perceptions of Chiefs increase our disbelief
The Chiefs are winning so often and at such a high level, including in the past two Super Bowls, that even the betting markets seem surprised when they don’t dominate on the scoreboard.
Point spreads can be instructive here.
The Chiefs are 6-1 over their past seven games without covering the spread once, according to TruMedia.
Since 2000, 21 other teams have played exactly seven consecutive games without coverage. They combined for a record of 18-129 (.122) during those streaks. That’s 6-1 for the Chiefs, 18-129 for everyone else.
It’s another way to feel like the Chiefs are underperforming even when they win, raising questions about their legitimacy even if they’re not the ones setting the expectations.
Winning without impressing can be a Kansas City phenomenon.
The 2020 Chiefs went 5-0 over a five-game stretch without covering the spread, the only team to accomplish the feat since 2000. The 2018 Chiefs own the second-best record since 2000 (3-3) among teams that failed to cover. for six consecutive games.
Nothing seems to come easy for these 2024 Chiefs.
Their percentage of explosive plays — defined as rushes that gain more than 12 yards and passes that gain more than 15 yards — has dropped to 8.5 percent this season. That ranks 30th, ahead of only the Las Vegas Raiders and New York Giants, who have 2-11 records. The percentage is down from 10.5 percent last season, which ranked 16th, and barely half of what it was in 2018 (15.7 percent, which ranked second).
Kansas City nonetheless ranks eighth in offensive EPA per play, as the Chiefs have shown a great ability to sustain long drives, in part because Mahomes ranks first in EPA per passing play on third-and-four downs (he ranks 24th in early downs). Kansas City’s defense, which has fallen to 18th in EPA per game this season after ranking fifth in 2023, ranks 25th in turnovers forced (10) this season and 27th in the past three seasons.
Longer, more difficult runs by the offense, combined with a defense that generally plays quite well but doesn’t take the ball away on a regular basis, could explain why games involving the Chiefs have fewer total possessions than games involving any team other than the Arizona Cardinals this season.
With fewer assets, each asset becomes more valuable, which could also add to Kansas City’s upside.
Why the Chiefs win so many close games
It would be difficult to reconcile the Chiefs’ 12-1 record with their plus-56 point differential without considering the role elite quarterbacks and coaches could play.
Most teams with a point differential near the Chiefs’ plus-56 would have records close to 8-5 through 13 games.
The Chiefs are one of seven teams since 1970 with more than 10 wins in 13 games despite a point differential between plus-51 and plus-61, according to Pro Football Reference.
Top TD records from 13 games with a margin of +51-61 points
Six of the seven had Hall of Fame-caliber quarterbacks and/or head coaches: Tom Brady and Bill Belichick with the 2003 New England Patriots; Aaron Rodgers with the 2021 Packers; a broken Peyton Manning (backed by an elite defense) with the 2015 Denver Broncos; Tom Landry with the 1981 Dallas Cowboys; Andy Reid with the Eagles from 2003; and of course Mahomes with Reid on these Chiefs.
Kansas City also has a consensus top-five defensive coordinator in Steve Spagnuolo.
These advantages can tilt the game results when profit margins are the smallest.
Mahomes in particular is a master scrambler during games and especially at critical moments. His scramble rate increases by about 50 percent in the fourth quarter of one-score games (9.8 percent, compared to 6.5 percent in all situations).
Competing for gains of 10 yards against the Chargers on Sunday and 33 yards against Carolina in Week 12 moved the Chiefs into field goal range on drives that ended with walk-off kicks. Last season, while protecting a 23-20 lead against the New York Jets, Mahomes scrambled 25 yards on third-and-23 to help the Chiefs run the final 7:24 off the game clock with a 15-play drive .
The chart below shows the EPA he added through the 2023 and 2024 seasons, including playoffs, fourth-quarter scrambles and overtime when no more than eight points separated Kansas City from its opponents on the scoreboard. Mahomes is so much more productive than others that he’s almost off the chart.
About seven of these league-leading scrambles added at least 5 percent to the Chiefs’ odds of winning, according to Next Gen Stats.
While a number of critical referees have helped the Chiefs win close games recently, including a pass interference call against Cincinnati on fourth-and-16 in the final minute of Week 2, Kansas City ranks just 15th in penalty EPA per game in the fourth quarter of the game. games with one goal in the last two seasons. Seattle has benefited the most in these situations and Cleveland the least.
The Chiefs, despite their recent turnovers at kicker, have made all 18 field goal attempts in the fourth quarter of one-score games over the past two seasons. Their average punt distance in these situations is the sixth-shortest in the league (35.2 yards), likely because Mahomes and the offense do such a good job of getting into position. Cincinnati, on the other hand, averages 46.4 yards on these punts.
The smallest things can make the biggest differences in the most critical situations.
What it means in the playoffs
Before the Chiefs, the 1976 Oakland Raiders held the distinction of being the 12-1 team with the lowest point differential (plus-89). That Raiders team won the Super Bowl, but only after overcoming a 21-10 deficit in the fourth quarter and beating New England in the first round of the playoffs. Oakland got a 1-yard touchdown pass from Ken Stabler in the final 10 seconds to win 24-21 after officials controversially flagged the Patriots for roughing the passer on a third-and-18 incompletion. Not that hard to imagine Kansas City pulling off something similar, right?
We could also revisit the list of teams that were 10-3 or better through 13 games, but with a point differential similar to Kansas City’s this season.
Those 2003 Patriots and the 2015 Broncos won the Super Bowl. The 1978 Rams and 1981 Cowboys reached the NFC title game. The 2021 Packers lost in the divisional round. The 2013 Eagles lost in the wild card round.
The Chiefs’ ability to win so many close games is a big reason why Kansas City has a 78 percent chance of securing a first-round playoff appearance and home field advantage in the playoffs.
That means Kansas City likely only needs to win two playoff games to reach another Super Bowl.
What is a two-game winning streak for a team that has won fifteen games in a row by one score?
(Photo: Perry Knotts/Getty Images)
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