Does Patrick Mahomes remember his first game at Texas Tech? Of course he does.
“I mean my first game at Tech I came in in the fourth quarter,” Mahomes said Monday via quotes from the Chiefs. “I was a little excited and a little jumpy, but I feel like now with having Alex (Smith) in front of me and Tyler (Bray) and the guys I can kind of learn off of the them and then when my time comes I have a little more experience going into it.”
It’s safe to say things will be different as he prepares for his first NFL game this weekend against the 49ers. As the 10th overall pick, there has to be a lot of pressure for Mahomes ... but not as much pressure as the No. 1 overall pick!
Alex Smith was a No. 1 pick in 2005 with more pressure back then than Mahomes is feeling right now. This is some honest stuff from Alex.
“I carried a lot of weight, a lot of anxiety,” Alex said to the media on Monday. “I was starting. A lot of expectations, I put a lot of pressure on myself. Sometimes you are your own worst enemy. If you can just go out and let your natural abilities take over and play and get out of your own way, that’s easy to say, hard to do sometimes. But, yeah, as a player, it took me a while to learn that and get past that. It is definitely what I remember looking back.”
The next question Alex was very honest again saying that Mahomes is more natural.
“Just that, right?” Alex said. “It’s just ball, go play. He’s different than me. Everybody is. He is wired different. I mean that in a good way, he is just more natural. I think he has a better grasp on in. I was pretty worked up, like I said, in starting and a lot of expectations. It is just a different place, and I think that is a positive for him. I think he is in a better place so he will be able to just go out and play.”
Mahomes is in a much better place than Alex was when they each started their careers. They were both really young (21) in these situations - I was more worried about how may Miller Lites I could drink at age 21 than I think they were - but Mahomes doesn’t have the pressure of starting that Alex did in San Francisco. Alex has talked about that a number of times and at one point in his career (pre-Harbaugh) it looked like playing so early was going to ruin him.
It didn’t, though. Alex is better for that and the Chiefs quarterback of the future will be better for that because he has Alex there.