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Kansas City Chiefs Need To Be Careful In Their Pursuit of Deep Passing Game

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Last season, the Kansas City Chiefs did a pretty terrible job of pushing the ball down the field. With little help from their wide receivers, the Chiefs had four passing plays 35 yards or deeper. Let that sink in… four. Four big passing plays all season long is just disastrous, so it was no surprise that the team added Jeremy Maclin in free agency and moved speedy DeAnthony Thomas to receiver with Travis Kelce at tight end. The goal is to get Alex Smith to push the ball downfield more and make life easier for Jamaal Charles, but the Chiefs seriously need to be careful asking Smith to do that.

Part of the reason why is because of Smith himself, and part of it is the Chiefs’ offense as a whole.

Starting with Smith himself, I think he’s always been sort of overlooked as a quarterback. He may not make highlight-reel plays all the time, but he is far and away the best game manager in the league. The problem with him though is that he’s so incredibly inconsistent. First, he’s too quick to scramble for yards, then he’s standing in the pocket and taking a big hit to get the pass out. He’ll drop a ball into a receiver beautifully, then he’ll horribly misfire the next pass trying to keep it away from a defender. Smith excels so well with short routes because they’re easier and quicker; there’s less time to make a mistake, targets are bigger, and throws are easier. Being an effective downfield passer requires some sort of consistency that Smith can’t stick to.

But it’s not all Smith’s fault.  The entire Chief offense outside of the running game has been inconsistent. The offensive line’s pass protection was just as volatile as Smith was — some games they’d protect well, while in others they were a turnstile. It never seemed like there was any set rhythm at all outside of the ground game. Combine that with a receiving corp that was a few small but distinct clicks above useless and it’s difficult to sustain any play opportunity downfield.

Now that they’re adding entirely new pieces in Maclin, a positional switch in Thomas and a still emerging player in Albert Wilson, they now have to worry about the chemistry being strong enough. There are just too many variables in Kansas City that aren’t settled yet for the team to start pushing Smith and the passing game to new heights. Not to say that it can’t be done, but I think there’s a lot of work and a lot of things that need to happen first. Developing a deep passing threat is something that needs to happen, without a doubt. But the Chiefs would be very smart to ease this process along. If they push too hard, they could be looking at another offensive meltdown and another long year for Charles.

Doug Green is a Featured Writer for www.RantSports.com covering the Philadelphia Eagles and the NFL.  Follow him on Twitter @DGreenNFL. 

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