Super Bowl LVII: Kansas City Chiefs vs Philadelphia Eagles
This Sunday sees the Kansas City Chiefs take on the Philadelphia Eagles in Super Bowl 57. The Chiefs overcame their AFC nemesis in a hard fought win over the Bengals whilst the Eagles booked their spot with a convincing win versus the 49ers.
This the first time that we have had two 14 win teams in the Super Bowl since the 1998 season when Denver defeated Atlanta. Even in that matchup, the Falcons were the second seed team so we are truly being treated to an incredible high level matchup between the leagues two best teams who are both seeded 1st in their respective conferences.
The first of the two biggest storylines for this matchup are Andy Reid coaching his Chiefs against an Eagles franchise who he led from 1999-2012. During his time in Philadelphia, Reid took them to a Super Bowl where they were defeated by the Patriots and also lost 4 NFC title games so by the time he left the franchise there were question marks over whether he could get it done in the big one.
11 years on from his firing he now has a chance to become just the 15th coach in history to win multiple Super Bowls and is already one of only 6 head coaches to lead two different teams to the Super Bowl. If the Chiefs do end up winning Super Bowl LIV, then Andy Reid will solidify his standing as a future Hall of Fame coach and put him in an even more select category of coaching legends.
To do this he’ll need his defence to step up like they did versus the Bengals in the AFC Title Game. Steve Spagnuolo is the man leading this Chiefs’ defence and Reid will be happy with the pass defence throughout the season. Despite criticism throughout the season, especially in the secondary, Kansas City are only giving up only 6 yards per attempt.
The KC pass rush is also very good with Frank Clark and Chris Jones being the obvious standouts. The ideal game plan for Kansas City would be for their offense to get ahead early to allow their pass rush to get into this game because we know that the Eagles often go with a run-heavy approach.
Unfortunately for the the Chiefs, they can certainly be run on but if it gets to a situation where the Eagles are forced into a shootout or are in 2nd or even 3rd and long passing down situations then this will give Frank Clark and Chris Jones the best chance to make an impact.
Doing this will be a massive ask though because the Eagles definitely have the best offensive line in the entire league. Lane Johnson, Jordan Mailata and Jason Kelce have all been outstanding this season and really are the guy to allowing the Eagles running backs success as well as giving Jaylen Hurts time in the pocket.
Jason Kelce in particular will be fired up for this game as he will be going against his brother Travis so it’ll be a momentous moment in the Kelce household! Travis will be the main man on the Chiefs offense as he is Patrick Mahomes go to guy and is a nightmare for any defence to handle.
Against Jacksonville, the Chiefs superstar tight end caught 14 passes for 98 yards and 2 touchdowns. Then against Cincinnati he averaged over 10 yards per reception as he hauled in 7 catches for 78 yards and a touchdown.
The Eagles’ cornerbacks have been outstanding this year and they are going to need Darius Slay and James Bradberry to win their one-on-one matchups so that the safeties can double up on Travis Kelce and crowd the middle of the field but that’s easier said than done.
As we know, the Chiefs offense is the best in the league good and Mahomes is the key reason why. In terms of sack rate, Mahomes doesn’t take many sacks which allows KC to keep moving the trains, establish the run when needed and put up points on their opponents.
For me this means that the Eagles offense has to score a lot of points in this matchup to have a change of winning. I think that they need to score 25+ to win a second Lombardi trophy because as much as I think their secondary to go along with an outstanding D line, they cannot rely on their defence to carry them in this game as it’s inevitable that the Chiefs’ offense is also going to score points.
Now we know the Eagles possess outstanding talent throughout the roster and in wide receiver AJ Brown they have one of the best in the entire NFL. He’s so good that to a point he’s actually made people forget how good DeVonta Smith is so these two receivers can cause the Chiefs lots of problems on Sunday.
I’ve looked and the Chiefs are 1st in the league in press snaps. This means that their cornerbacks are always aggressive and they don’t give up many easy completions on the outside. They did well against Higgins and Chase in that win over the Bengals so the Eagles will need to have a way to beat press coverage by hoping that the sheer talent of AJ Brown and Smith winning one-on-one battles is enough to give Hurts passing opportunities.
I expect the Eagles to run many RPO’s and to get their receivers going in motion to prevent their wideouts being pressed at the line as scrimmage as much as possible. In addition to this, the X factor to this game for me for the Eagles is Dallas Goedert because regardless of much the KC corners press if the eagles can expose the middle of the field then even if Spagnuolo brings a safety on Goedert he can still make things happen and open this passing game up for the Eagles offense.
I could talk about both of these teams all day long and this game is so tight to call but there’s no overlooking how key the quarterback matchup is in a Super Bowl. Yes Hurts played at an MVP level this season but Patrick Mahomes is a generational quarterback.
Even as a Tom Brady fanatic I have to say that Mahomes for me, especially after this season, is one of the best I’ve ever seen at the positon in terms of making everyone around him better in an offense as he has still managed to lead a league leading offense despite so many new members in the team.
Now we know the Chiefs don’t have a star receiver and the eagles can take advantage of that, but for me the X factor to this Kansas. offense for me are the running backs. We saw rookie Isiah Pacheco involved in the passing game a lot more than usual against the Bengals as he had 59 receiving yards from 6 catches.
I also feel that after two mediocre games for Jerick McKinnon that he’ll finally be involved this week. We know that he was a red zone monster in the regular season, 9 receiving touchdowns on 56 catches, and the Chiefs do a great job scheming plays up for him by using the attention that Travis Kelce demands when the KC offense gets in the red zone.
As much as I said I could sit here and talk about both teams all day, I’ve also been in a constant battle with myself in terms of choosing a winner because Mahomes and the Chiefs led the NFL in yards per pass attempt whereas Philadelphia’s defence led the NFL in fewest yards allowed per pass attempt.
Another eye catching stat is that Philadelphia are 14-0 this season when running for more than 100 yards, and as mentioned Kansas City are prone to giving up yards on the ground. There have been question marks over the strength of their schedule but nobody should take anything away from how great this roster is.
Despite the respect I have for the Eagles and especially this defence I feel like Mahomes will Andy Reid will remember the beating they took in that 31-9 Super Bowl defeat to Tampa Bay on the 7th February 2021 and use the similarities in that talented defence with Eagles one to come up with an answer on Sunday.
We saw Tom Brady get beaten up by the Giants twice with pressure up the middle but then used those defeats to help him in the Patriots’ Super Bowl victories against a Seahawks whose defence is regarded as one of the best we’ve even seen with a great secondary and strong pass rush, along with the victory against the Rams by getting the ball out early and not allowing Aaron Donald to get to him.
If Mahomes wants to one day be regarded in the same breath as Tom Brady then ensuring that he doesn’t fall to 1-2 in Super Bowl’s come Sundays final whistle feels essentially in this young man’s career. I’ve watched Brady cement his status as the goat with multiple legacy defining moments and there’s no denying that great coaches and quarterbacks know how to adjust to situations they’ve seen before.
I’ve also previously compared this Chiefs team to the Patriots 2018 team who were also particularly battle hardened as they beat Kansas City on the road in the AFC title game before defeating a very good Rams team in the big one.
I feel like the Chiefs path to this occasion has had similar defining moments which have shown their championship calibre and the key comparison here is Andy Reid, Patrick co Mahomes and Travis Kelce to Bill Belichick, Tom Brady and Rob Gronkowski because when you have the best head coach, quarterback and tight end trio in the league it’s hard to bet against.
That’s not to say that this Eagles team isn’t championship worthy and if Philadelphia do win on Sunday then Nick Sirianni will silence a lot of doubters by taking his team to the top of the mountain. Ultimately, I’ll end this piece on another comparison which is something I’ve touched on before; This Eagles team has shown various similarities to a Carolina Panthers team that lost Super Bowl 50 to Denver so sadly for Philadelphia fans, I think the 2022 Eagles will suffer the same fate and fall short on Sunday.
Kansas City Chiefs 24-20 Philadelphia Eagles
