Early in his career, Patrick Mahomes was one of the best quarterbacks in the NFL when it came to throwing deep touchdown passes. Over the last two years (not coincidentally after Tyreek Hill was traded), that has changed. This year, Mahomes is back to finding the end zone with his deep ball.
According to Next Gen Stats, Mahomes has thrown two touchdown passes that traveled 20-plus yards this season: a 35-yard touchdown pass to Xavier Worthy in Week 1 and a 44-yard touchdown pass to Rashee Rice in Week 2. That means he’s thrown as many touchdown passes on balls traveling 20-plus yards this season as he has in the 2022 and 2023 seasons combined.
From 2018 to 2021, Mahomes threw 44 deep touchdown passes. So in his first four seasons, Mahomes averaged nearly a deep ball touchdown pass per game. In the next two seasons, Mahomes averaged just one per season. And now he’s back to averaging one per game.
The addition of Worthy, who was drafted in the first round after setting the Scouting Combine record for the fastest 40-yard dash, was intended to help Mahomes widen the field and make the Chiefs’ offense even more dangerous.
