After the Kansas City Chiefs’ Week 11 loss to the Buffalo Bills, quarterback Patrick Mahomes told reporters that “the undefeated thing was cool, but that’s not our ultimate goal.”
In order to reach that “ultimate goal” — KC’s third straight Super Bowl title — Mahomes explained how his team can learn from this defeat in Buffalo.
“You can use it as fuel,” the Chiefs QB began. “Like I said, that’s a good football team. So, nothing to hang your hat on losing to them, but we feel like we can play better.”
“We’ll get back to work and try to use this as a spark so that we can be a better football team in the end,” Mahomes went on. He also added that “we have to have a better sense of urgency” throughout the entire game. The two-time NFL MVP included himself in that critique.
“I’m hoping that it is a benefit,” Mahomes noted later. “I mean, I’m not going to say we were relaxed, but at the same time, I feel like we were just coming away with these wins at the end of games. I think [the loss to the Bills] is going to spark us to have more urgency, especially at the start of football games, especially with the offense. That comes from me.”
After the game, Mahomes had an on-field message for Bills quarterback Josh Allen, and it involved the two teams meeting up in the playoffs. He hinted at a potential postseason rematch during his postgame press conference as well.
“At the end of the day, that’s a really good football team,” Mahomes reiterated after Week 11. “It’s going to take your best football to beat great football teams, and we didn’t play our best football today, and they went out there and beat us. That’s how it rolls in the NFL.”
“All the respect to them, man,” the Chiefs QB continued, praising Buffalo. “That’s going to be a good football team that we’ll probably see again.”
Since Mahomes and Allen took over as the respective quarterbacks of these two franchises, the Chiefs and Bills have both beaten each other four times. The major difference is that KC has won all three playoff matchups, while Buffalo has mostly been victorious during the regular season.
Mahomes’ Chiefs have actually only defeated Allen’s Bills once in a non-playoff clash — the first time on October 19, 2020. Since then, Buffalo has dominated Kansas City in regular season outings, but they’ve yet to win when it’s mattered most
After throwing at least one interception in each of the Chiefs’ first seven games, Mahomes put together clean outings against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Denver Broncos. That two-game streak ended early in Buffalo.
Mahomes was intercepted on his first pass attempt of the game in Week 11. Later, he was intercepted again on his final pass attempt.
Overall, it wasn’t a horrible outing from the Chiefs’ future Hall of Famer, but it was another imperfect one. Mahomes finished with 10 incompletions (69.7%), 2 sacks taken and just under 200 passing yards.
This performance earned him a total QBR rating of 62.7 out of 100 and a passer rating of 90.0. Those marks rank sixth best (QBR) and fifth best (passer rating) for Mahomes on the season, respectively.
Michael Obermuller covers the NFL and NHL for Heavy.com, where he began writing in 2021. His areas of focus include the Kansas City Chiefs, New York Giants, Pittsburgh Steelers and Miami Dolphins, as well as the New York Rangers and New York Islanders. An NYC area native and Quinnipiac graduate, his previous bylines include FanDuel’s The Duel, King Fantasy Sports and Pro Football Mania. More about Michael Obermuller