Patrick Mahomes is having the worst season of his career. Does it matter?

Seven weeks after their attempt at immortality, the Kansas City Chiefs are still undefeated. They’ve picked up wins against the likes of the Ravens, 49ers and Bengals en route to a 6-0 start. Defensively, they’ve become elite, putting a succession of the game’s best quarterbacks through the blender. The champions in a row should have the feel of a runaway juggernaut, but something isn’t right with KC’s offense.

Considering his body of work, Patrick Mahomes is the best quarterback in the NFL. That is not an opinion, but a statement of fact. But through the opening stretch of the season, the Chiefs have run a mediocre offense and Mahomes has been a statistically mediocre quarterback. The Chiefs’ offense has yet to score 30 points in a game, despite facing just one defense in the top 12 in EPA/play, a measure of a unit’s overall effectiveness.

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Give Mahomes that kind of schedule in a normal year, and you can turn in your MVP ballot in October and head to the cocktail bar. Instead, the Chiefs quarterback is coming off the worst regular season of his career and Lamar Jackson is, rightly, the favorite to win MVP for the second year in a row. Mahomes, on the other hand, is completing a whopping 67% of his passes but has thrown just six touchdowns and eight interceptions. His seven-week passer rating (82.5) is 20 points below his career average (102.5). If that’s not enough, Mahomes has had more games this season where he threw for less than 150 yards than games where he eclipsed 300 yards.

But those numbers aren’t illustrative of Mahomes’ overall play. There have still been moments of individual brilliance, with the quarterback carrying a beleaguered offense over the line in tight games. He continues to influence games with his legs, trying to avoid negative play or keep the chains moving. But as we approach the halfway point of the regular season, KC’s passing game has reached one of the lowest levels of the quarterback’s career.

“I just don’t think it’s normal from what you’ve seen from us because there’s not a lot of passing touchdowns,” Mahomes said this week. “There has been a lot of turnover, especially with me. So I think it just shows the versatility of our team. It’s not just about me. It’s not just about the stats and the light show and stuff like that. It’s about team football.”

At his best, Mahomes is an insult to himself: a smooth playmaker who distorts defenses, takes them out of the pocket or extends plays to create shots downfield. But that version of Mahomes has yet to appear this season. These days, Mahomes plays with old men. He changes characters with each possession. Old swashbuckling Mahomes is in there, ready to erupt when necessary. But Mahomes, who is still only 29, now spends long games channeling Drew Brees in the late stages, handing the ball to the team’s blues and methodically marching the Chiefs down the field.

As Mahomes says, that’s team football. But on Wednesday, the Chiefs traded for veteran receiver DeAndre Hopkins, an acknowledgment that the game wasn’t clicking and they needed to find a quick solution.

Mahomes has the lowest average air yards in the league this season. He is more sensitive to pressure than in recent years. For the first time in his career, he has panicked (somewhat) because of the pressure. What’s most troubling is that the big throws have largely disappeared, while boneheaded decisions have crept into his game.

Six games is a small sample size, but the start of this season is in many ways a continuation of a trend that started last year. The Chiefs have become a hyper-efficient offense, focusing on their run game and relying on Mahomes to play flawless football in a more rhythm-based passing game. It’s a style that requires the quarterback to be flawless — and Mahomes hasn’t always kept his end of the bargain.

However, last season should have been an anomaly. The miracle of KC’s second straight title was that they won the Super Bowl with an incomplete roster. Despite Mahomes being under center, the team’s passing game routinely stalled during the regular season. Outside of Travis Kelce, the team’s receiver room was filled with have-beens and can-bes, with the Chiefs relying on newcomer Rashee Rice to bring some spice to a lackluster position group. By the time the playoffs rolled around, however, the offense took off: the Chiefs’ run game hammered the defensive fronts, Mahomes found chemistry with Rice, Kelce was at his best, and the quarterback tied his cape at crucial moments . With a top-five defense and an excellent offensive line, the champagne flowed.

However, that was meant to be a recipe for a year. Early in Mahomes’ career, the Chiefs were a scoring machine so ruthless that they could chase a title without defense. Last season they won it all with a suffocating defense and a stumbling offense. This year both would rise together.

The Chiefs addressed their weapons shortage this offseason by drafting receiver Xavier Worthy and signing Hollywood Brown in free agency. Both were acquired to add some pop to the passing game, stretching the field vertically. The duo would clear space for Kelce, Rice and Skyy Moore to attack underneath and extend drives or create yards after the catch. Combine a revamped passing game with a blistering run game, and the team can lighten the load on Mahomes and prepare the Dom Perignon.

But injuries derailed those plans. Brown suffered an injury that is expected to sideline him for the entire regular season. Rice suffered a knee injury in week two and was placed on injured reserve, forcing the Chiefs to sign JuJu Smith-Schuster, who subsequently suffered a hamstring injury against the Niners. That left the Chiefs out of options, with only Kelce a reliable target. Worthy has shown flashes as a rookie, but hasn’t been a reliable contributor. Moore, a 2022 second-round pick, has as many catches as he has this season: zero. Despite missing two games, Rice still ranks second on the team in goals scored, while Noah Gray, the team’s second tight end, ranks fourth in goals despite only playing half of the offense snaps played.

Receiver issues have forced the Chiefs to double down on their approach, increasing the pressure on Mahomes to be flawless. And that’s what’s so shocking this season: Mahomes continues to cough up ugly turnovers.

Mahomes is a walking firework. But his secret sauce has always been that he rarely puts the ball in danger. In his first season as a starter, he threw twelve picks, but in his next two seasons combined, he threw only eleven. Last season, however, he threw a career-high 14 interceptions while his touchdown total dropped to 27, a testament to a quarterback working through growing pains with a poor-passing receiving corps. However, in the playoffs, he didn’t throw a single turnover-worthy pitch until the Super Bowl. This season, sales figures have returned. He already has eight interceptions, putting him on pace for the worst total of his career. Six of those eight have come from clean pockets and he has the highest turnover-worthy throw percentage of his career, according to Pro Football Focus.

Not every interception was Mahomes’ fault. Some have come via tipped balls. Others are down to great defensive play (the other guys get paid too!). But given the shift in offensive focus, turnovers have been more painful for the offense than in years past.

Hopkins is unlikely to be a one-man solution. It’s a mystery how much tread is left on the tires of the 32-year-old, who is no longer at his peak. But if the receiver can provide reliable hands, it will be an upgrade from what Mahomes has been working on so far this season.

With Hopkins in the fold, the Chiefs can continue this iteration of their offense as long as Mahomes sharpens the ball. A quality defense, a solid offensive line and a steady Mahomes are enough to make the Chiefs contenders, with a few virtuoso moments from the quarterback likely to tip them over the top.

Mahomes is judged by a different set of rules than everyone else. The numbers for October no longer matter; it’s about adding a ring in January. Nothing about the regular season struggles screams about a player in decline, but rather speaks of a quarterback adapting to his circumstances.

It’s a long season. It will be fun to see Mahomes work his way out of the fog – again.