The Kansas City Chiefs have played a lot of good defensive fronts already this season.
In Week 2, the Eagles had one of the best front sevens in the league, especially with Fletcher Cox along the defensive line.
In Week 3, the Chargers brought one of the best pair of pass rushers the Chiefs will see this season in Melvin Ingram (three sacks) and Joey Bosa.
In Week 4, the Redskins defensive line came off a game where they were kicking the Raiders ass. Our Arrowhead Pride podcast partner and former Chiefs LB Shawn Barber mentioned this week how tough the Redskins defense was.
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“You take that and you get with our defensive line in training camp and it just stretches out even more. Each week, I think it’s a trend right now in the NFL, but it just seems every team you play has a dominant defensive line,” Chiefs OC Matt Nagy said this week.
This week, it doesn’t get any easier. The Texans have two of the best pair of defensive linemen in the game in JJ Watt and Jadeveon Clowney (who, by the way, has fewer career sacks than Dee Ford).
Everyone knows about Watt. He will affect the game. He will make the Chiefs get the ball out quick. Clowney has been coming on over the last year as well and — attention, Kareem Hunt! — he’s a really good run defender.
The problem here is the Chiefs are playing some backups on the interior of their offensive line. Center Mitch Morse is out and will be Zach Fulton, guard Laurent Duvernay-Tardif is out and will be replaced by someone (not sure who yet). Even the other guard Bryan Witzmann isn’t very experienced (four career games).
This is going to be a big test. The Chiefs line has to be better.