This is Patrick Mahomes’ favorite pass from Chiefs’ Super Bowl win vs. Eagles
Patrick Mahomes looks at the MacBook laptop screen, studying his movements from 180 days earlier.
It’s an August morning after a training camp practice, and the Kansas City Chiefs quarterback hunches over a round folding table in Missouri Western’s Blum Union, focusing in on the patterns he now knows by heart.
The safety taking the bait. The celebration that ensues afterward.
And now, he says, it’s time to tell the rest of the story.
The conversation began with a question to Mahomes — one that has some significance again this week with the Chiefs set to face the Philadelphia Eagles on Monday night in a rematch of last year’s Super Bowl.
What, you ask the quarterback, was his favorite throw from KC’s 38-35 Super Bowl LVII victory?
The one he chooses, he says, has special meaning.
This call wasn’t supposed to be in the Super Bowl playbook. The Chiefs figured they’d run it too many times recently. They knew the Eagles would be preparing for it.
And yet, leading up to the game, Mahomes’ meetings with coach Andy Reid, then-offensive coordinator Eric Bieniemy and then-QBs coach Matt Nagy guided all of them to the same place.
“We were just like, ‘We’ve got to put this play in,’” Mahomes said.
The decision ended up altering KC football history.
Mahomes’ most revered pass in Super Bowl LVII, he says, is from the offense’s opening drive: an 18-yard touchdown to tight end Travis Kelce in the first quarter.
That leads Mahomes to an anecdote, and also an Easter egg you might not have noticed.
Two of the biggest throws of his career, it turns out, have now come on this exact same play.
What the Chiefs needed
The key, current Chiefs offensive coordinator Matt Nagy says, is the coverage tendencies.
For the “out-and-up” to work — the route Kelce executed on his 18-yard touchdown catch — the Chiefs need to get a specific defense across from them.
Film study led Mahomes and the coaches to this conclusion: As much as the Chiefs had shown this play, it still had a good chance of success against the Eagles.
In these types of red-zone situations, Philadelphia had a tendency. It typically went with man-to-man coverage or Cover 4 Zone, which charges deep defenders with taking a quarter of the field each.
Here’s the kicker, though: With either of those looks, when Kelce breaks his route toward the sideline, he’ll essentially be going against a single defender.
And that was likely to be either a linebacker or safety.
“We liked that matchup,” Nagy said, “between (that defender) and Kelc.”
This takes some faith in your quarterback as well. If the Eagles mixed things up, Mahomes would be tasked with getting to a different progression while finding someone else on the backside of the play.
Here, though, the Eagles went with man coverage.
And if they’d have gone with Cover 4?
Well, the Chiefs already knew they could beat that — and on the biggest of stages, too.
Copying a game-winner
Mahomes says to go back and look at the replay. You can see it then for yourself.
Kelce’s famous out-and-up in the Super Bowl was the carbon copy of another famous moment in Chiefs history.
And that was the game-winning score — in overtime — of KC’s “13 seconds” playoff victory over the Buffalo Bills in January 2022.
“It’s the same play,” Mahomes said.
And a closer inspection shows just why the Chiefs like it in these scenarios.
Buffalo is playing Cover 4, which means linebacker Matt Milano’s responsibility is to cover Kelce when he initially runs to the flat.
That doesn’t go well for Milano. Kelce shakes outside — with Milano closing on the out route — before the tight end shimmies back upfield. Then-Chiefs receiver Tyreek Hill, in this instance, attracts two deep zone defenders with a post route in the end zone, clearing all the room that Kelce needs.
The video shows Mahomes giving a quick pump-fake toward Hill for good measure, then firing to Kelce for the touchdown near the sideline.
Milano is in pursuit. But there’s nothing he can do.
“It’s perfect for these coverages,” Mahomes said.
Which is why the Chiefs got it ready again a year later in the Super Bowl.
Even if the Eagles might’ve guessed it was coming.
Mahomes-Kelce magic (and belief)
Nagy remembers his initial thoughts once he heard coach Andy Reid call Kelce’s play on the headset of Super Bowl LVII: “There’s a high percentage of this being a completion.”
It was more than just preparation, though. Nagy said there’s something to be said about a call when everyone believes it will work.
“We’ve run it throughout the year and the previous years,” Nagy said. “But when you have a play that guys have confidence in ... first of all, it’s going to Kelce. Second of all, Pat has confidence.”
And on this snap, the Eagles played it precisely as the Chiefs hoped.
Philadelphia had man coverage, putting safety Marcus Epps on Kelce. Epps had done his homework, Mahomes says, which is evident as he rewatches the replay.
“We run this play a lot where (Kelce) has the option to break in or out, and we did the out-and-up,” Mahomes said. “You can tell the DB knows we run this play a lot, because when (Kelce) breaks out, that DB tries to trail to that back hip, thinking I’m gonna throw the ball.”
Mahomes, however, does not.
He waits until Kelce completes his fake-out, as the tight end acts like he’s headed toward the sideline before jerking back upfield.
Epps stumbles while trying to cover the double move.
Checkmate.
“They bit on it,” Nagy said, “which made it easier.”
From there, Mahomes says it’s “all about just putting it out there and letting him (Kelce) make a play.”
Kelce cradled the pass over his right shoulder at the goal line, slipping on the turf before celebrating the touchdown that tied the game at 7.
“It was a sweet call,” receiver Justin Watson said.
“I think it kind of jumped everything off for us,” Mahomes added.
“Especially to start the Super Bowl with a touchdown to those two guys,” Nagy said, “that was awesome.”
Mahomes sees the touchdown as more than just a few seconds of proper execution, though.
It was the Chiefs knowing the opponent ... but also themselves. It was realizing the other team knew what might be coming ... but having the chutzpah to call it anyway.
It was the audacity to call the same Kelce route that had already won a game for the Chiefs in the playoffs.
And when it all came together in Super Bowl LVII? The result is a pass Mahomes says he’ll always remember as his favorite.
“Obviously,” he said, “we like the play.”
This story was originally published November 16, 2023 at 6:00 AM with the headline "This is Patrick Mahomes’ favorite pass from Chiefs’ Super Bowl win vs. Eagles."
