Chiefs-Jaguars snap counts: Joshua Williams and Jaylen Watson split time

The Kansas City Chiefs evened their season record at 1-1 with a 17-9 victory over the Jacksonville Jaguars on Sunday afternoon.

Let’s see how Kansas City used its players in Week 2.

Starters (offensive): TE Travis Kelce, TE Noah Gray, WR Marquez Valdes-Scantling, LT Donovan Smith, LG Joe Thuney, C Creed Humphrey, RG Trey Smith, RT Jawaan Taylor, WR Justin Watson, QB Patrick Mahomes and RB Isiah Pacheco.

Starters (defensive): DE Michael Danna, DT Derrick Nnadi, DT Chris Jones, DE George Karlaftis, S Justin Reid, LB Willie Gay Jr., LB Nick Bolton, CB Trent McDuffie, CB Joshua Williams, CB L’Jarius Sneed and S Bryan Cook.

Did not play: QB Blaine Gabbert.

Inactive: RB La’Mical Perine, CB Nic Jones, DE BJ Thompson, OL Wanya Morris, T Lucas Niang, DE Neil Farrell and DT Keondre Coburn.

Offensive takeaways

• Much has been made about head coach Andy Reid benching right tackle Jawaan Taylor after he drew multiple penalties. But as it turned out, Taylor missed only two plays. The team took him out, talked to him on the sideline for a couple of plays and sent him back out onto the field.
• While tight end Travis Kelce didn’t get the kind of workload he would normally get — something around 80% of the offensive snaps — he was on the field for 64%. That’s a good indicator that could be back to getting a full workload (and returning to his normal production) pretty soon.
• Marquez Valdes-Scantling — with 81% of the offensive snaps — was the only wide receiver to get starter-level use. No other wideout had more than 61%.
• Kadarius Toney was only on the field for 19 snaps — 30% of the total. After the game, Reid said that Toney’s left foot was “bothering him a little bit,” but that he had been in for “most of the plays” that had been planned for him. Fun fact: Toney had five targets in 15 passing snaps.
• Wide receiver Justyn Ross was on the field for eight snaps — just 13% of the total.

Defensive takeaways

• As usual, Trent McDuffie, L’Jarius Sneed, Justin Reid and Bryan Cook were the every-snap players of the defensive unit.
• Linebacker Nick Bolton and edge rushers George Karlaftis and Mike Danna were in the next tier at around 80% of the snaps.
• The rest of the defensive players — including defensive tackle Chris Jones (48%) — had rotational percentages.
• Unlike in Week 1 — when Joshua Williams had all of the snaps at slot cornerback — both Williams (47% of the defensive snaps) and Jaylen Watson (30%) split them. It looks like the team is still going to rotate them at the position in at least some games. Watson was used more often on passing downs.
• Felix Anudike-Uzomah was in for 23% of the snaps — predominantly on passing downs.

Special teams takeaways

• Linebackers Leo Chenal and Jack Cochrane — along with defensive backs Chamarri Conner and Joshua Williams — were the backbones of the special teams units.

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