Chiefs-Raiders: Making sense of snap counts

The Kansas City Chiefs dropped their first game of the season on Sunday, falling to the Las Vegas Raiders 40-32 at Arrowhead Stadium.

Let’s see how Chiefs players were used in Week 5.

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Starters (offensive): WR Tyreek Hill, LT Eric Fisher, LG Kelechi Osemele, C Austin Reiter, RG Andrew Wylie, RT Mitchell Schwartz, TE Travis Kelce, TE Nick Keizer, WR Mecole Hardman, QB Patrick Mahomes and RB Clyde Edwards-Helaire.

Starters (defensive): LDE Tanoh Kpassagnon, LDT Chris Jones, RDT Derrick Nnadi, RDE Frank Clark, LB Anthony Hitchens, LB Damien Wilson, LB Willie Gay Jr., LCB Charvarius Ward, RCB Bashaud Breeland, FS Juan Thornhill and SS Tyrann Mathieu.

Did not play: QB Chad Henne.

Inactive: RB DeAndre Washington, LB Darius Harris, DE Demone Harris, OL Yasir Durant and TE Ricky Seals-Jones

Editor’s Note: Arrowhead Pride obtains snap count data from the NFL’s game stats and information system, which allows us to break out snap counts by run or pass on offensive and defensive plays. Because GSIS data ignores plays that were nullified by penalties, total offensive and defensive snap counts will vary from other sources, which get their data from NFL Gamebooks

Offensive takeaways

After wide receiver Sammy Watkins was injured, Mecole Hardman and Demarcus Robinson had a very similar percentage of snaps. Hardman was used as an every-down player, while Robinson was used a little more on passing downs. Hardman continued to get his usual work in special teams.

Meanwhile, Byron Pringle had his highest use of the season on offense — all of it on passing downs.

At running back, Clyde Edwards-Helaire saw his lowest use of the season — and also the widest disparity between running and passing plays. Darrel Williams got the extra snaps — mostly on passing plays. Once again, Darwin Thompson didn’t see the field on offense, while DeAndre Washington — just promoted to the active roster from the practice squad — was inactive for the game.

After several games in which his use declined, tight end Travis Kelce’s use increased to 90% of the offensive snaps. And for the first time this season, he was used on a near-equal percentage of running and passing plays.

Defensive takeaways

Coming off his groin injury, defensive tackle Chris Jones was used a little less often than we would typically see. That led to a corresponding frop in Mike Pennel’s use. Against the Raiders, both were used as every-down players.

At defensive end, Alex Okafor had a season-high percentage of snaps on defense — which appeared to be at the expense of Tanoh Kpassagnon.

Rookie linebacker Willie Gay Jr.’s use on defense continued to steadily increase, while he continued to get his share of special-teams plays.

In his first game back from suspension, Bashuad Breeland was used on 73% of the defensive snaps, which came at the expense of Rashad Fenton and Antonio Hamilton. Meanwhile, Daniel Sorensen had a season-low percentage of snaps, accompanied by a higher percentage of special-teams plays.

Linebacker Anthony Hitchens apparently missed relatively few plays as a result of the hand injury he suffered in the game; he was in for a pretty normal percentage of snaps. Ben Niemann appears to have taken up the few snaps he missed — and like Sorensen, had a season-high percentage of use on special teams.