Two things we knew were confirmed in the Chiefs loss to the Patriots. If you give Knile Davis enough carries you know a fumble is coming. And if you give Andy Reid the opportunity to, he'll screw up the clock.
Eagles fans warned Chiefs fans about this when Andy Reid was hired. We have seen glimpses of Reid's clock management problems but we haven't seen it on a national stage with so much at stake. That changed on Saturday afternoon in Foxboro.
The Chiefs execution at the end of each half was not good. The Chiefs used two timeouts on the first drive of the game and another later, which left them with no timeouts when driving in the red zone late in the first half. They spiked the ball with less than a minute left after converting a first down because they didn't have a timeout left. That is essentially a wasted play and that gave the Chiefs one fewer play to run before they were forced to kick a field goal on fourth down to make it 14-6.
The clock management at the end of the game had NFL media people saying there's Andy Reid and his clock management again. Everyone knew it. The Chiefs had a first and goal from the 1-yard line after Albert Wilson's huge 19-yard catch. They ran the next play at 2:33 and didn't get another play off. They wasted the two minute warning, ran one play on the goal line in just under a minute after they were huddling. They eventually scored but that gave the Patriots the ball back with just over a minute to play as opposed to just over two minutes to play.
Never mind that the drive took 16 plays and over five minutes, the Chiefs wasted a critical minute in the game.
Andy Reid, Alex Smith and the entire offense deserve blame for this. It HAS to improve but I just don't know how. Hire someone to stand right next to him? Someone in the booth? Is that not already happening? Every team in the NFL has fans who think their coach sucks at clock management so it's not all that unique to KC but we've seen the pattern here already with Reid.
There is more good than bad to Andy Reid. I'll take him now with his warts as opposed to rolling the dice on someone else's unproven offensive coordinator. But boy .... I really do know what Eagles fans meant. I really do.