The Chiefs became the first team in nearly 20 years to win back-to-back Super Bowls last year. But getting through the regular season was a bit of a slog for Kansas City last year, at least offensively.
The club finished No. 9 in yards and No. 15 in points scored. Part of the issue was turnovers, as the Chiefs finished with 11 lost fumbles and 17 interceptions. Drops were a notorious problem as well.
So as Kansas City prepares to once again defend a championship, those struggles from 2023 are part of the motivation for 2024, according to quarterback Patrick Mahomes.
“You’ve got to come in with that same mentality you had the year before — even a higher intensity,” Mahomes said at his Tuesday press conference upon arriving for training camp. “And even though we won the Super Bowl last year, we felt like we didn’t play our best football — especially offensively. So, it’s our goal to be better that way. And come in with that mentality every single day.”
Mahomes added that the team has a lot of returning players on offense who understand what needs to be improved.
“Yeah, I mean, obviously the end result was awesome, but I think a lot of us still have a weird feeling in our mouth because we really didn’t play football the way we wanted to play all year long,” Mahomes said. “It wasn’t fun. Every single week, trying to just continue to get better and better and results not paying off the way you want them to — it wasn’t a lot of fun.”
In 16 games last year, Mahomes completed 67.2 percent of his passes for 4,183 yards with 27 touchdowns and 14 interceptions. That was his lowest yardage output since 2019, when he threw for 4,031 yards in just 14 games. He led the league with 5,250 yards and 41 touchdowns while playing all 17 contests in 2022.