Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce was visibly frustrated during Monday’s loss to the Raiders, at one point firing his helmet into a bench on the sideline.
While speaking with his brother, Jason, on the duo’s latest New Heights podcast, Travis’ frustration with how poorly Kansas City has been playing on offense was still quite clear. He called the loss embarrassing, saying everybody in the Chiefs’ building knows how embarrassing the performance was.
“It’s not just one guy,” Kelce said, via Adam Teicher of ESPN. “It’s not just me playing like dog shit. It’s not just us not being able to get the run game going. It’s not just us not being on the same page, passing-wise. Everybody’s in this f—ing thing together. Everybody at some point isn’t being accountable.
“Every single play is somebody not doing their job, and it’s me ... it’s everybody on the team. And whether that’s prep, whether that’s having the confidence and understanding of what the defense is in their coverages, their gaps in the run game, how we’re picking up blitzes, how we’re running routes versus certain coverages. All the above.”
Kelce, who has 90 catches for 968 yards with five touchdowns this season, added, “Everybody’s just got to f—ing do their job,” for the Chiefs to solve their myriad offensive issues.
“Throughout the season, we’ve shown during drives that we can be a high-powered offense if we don’t hurt ourselves with penalties, if we’re not playing first-and-f—ing-20,” Kelce said. “Every other drive or every other set of first downs just hasn’t been a well-oiled machine like we’ve been in the past, and we just got to get everybody on the same f—ing page.
“Maybe that’s just getting into the facility and just talking things out together. Maybe that’s getting a few reps after practice. Maybe that’s getting a few more reps, mental reps with each other in the film room. Whatever it is, we got to do something else because it’s been pretty consistent that we haven’t been on the same page. We just got to take a little bit more ownership in what we’re doing. And I’m not saying that I’m out of this. I’m the main part of this, and you got to try and find a way to clean this shit up.”
Kelce also took some personal accountability for throwing his helmet. Head coach Andy Reid had said Kelce did a nice job in the game after that moment, but Kielce himself disagreed with that assessment.
“He’s looking out for me, and I love him for it,” Kelce said. “I didn’t go back out there and play good. He wanted to see the fire in me, and I reacted in a bad way. He wanted to just get the best out of me. And right now, I’m just not playing my best football and I got to f—ing lock the f—k in and be more accountable for him. Be more accountable for my teammates.
“I got to keep my f—ing cool, man, because as a leader on this team, that’s not how you switch the momentum.”
The Chiefs can still clinch the AFC West with a victory over the Bengals this week. But it’s clear that something must change for Kansas City to be one of the conference’s true contenders in January.