Inside the secret plays Andy Reid and the Chiefs offense hold for the postseason

Andy Reid, have you ever been holding out on us?

Yearly, we anticipate the NFL’s longstanding offensive genius to dazzle us with the Kansas City Chiefs‘ playbook. Reid, 66, has been the Chiefs’ head coach since 2012 and was the Philadelphia Eagles‘ head coach earlier than that, from 1999 to 2012. There isn’t any scarcity of movie on his totally different ideations and their totally different iterations.

And if Reid is the architect, Patrick Mahomes is the carpenter, the one who turns the ideas into actuality.

However this 12 months, Kansas Metropolis’s offense hasn’t been as elegant as we have come to anticipate.

Because the Chiefs’ dynasty grows extra highly effective, there was a prevailing thought that Reid and Mahomes are sitting in such a robust place that they need not break into the depths of their playbook till the postseason. When the robust will get going, Reid picks the hardest calls in his playbook. Till then? It is not vanilla, but it surely’s not unique both.

“There are undoubtedly particular performs that we follow all through the season that we type of maintain onto. They’re practiced through the 12 months, and he’ll simply convey it out on the proper time, on the proper second,” former Chiefs quarterback Chad Henne instructed FOX Sports activities. 

Take the Rose Bowl spin that the Chiefs utilized in Tremendous Bowl LIV. Reid noticed that play by watching the 1948 Rose Bowl tape. (Sure, Reid famously watches previous sport movie, highschool movie, school movie and NFL movie searching for concepts.) The Chiefs launched that trick play in minicamp in 2019, however they saved it for 1,093 minutes of sport play — till they confronted a fourth-and-1 towards the San Francisco 49ers within the Tremendous Bowl.

“We practiced it each week, ensuring we had it,” Henne mentioned. “After which on the proper second, he brings it out, simply to offer one thing a bit of nuance and one thing totally different that the protection hasn’t seen.”

This 12 months’s AFC Championship Recreation proved there’s some fact to concept that Reid saves ideas. One instance was Kansas Metropolis’s fourth-and-1 name towards the Bills. 

The Chiefs rushed to the road and ran play-action with Isiah Pacheco earlier than Mahomes scrambled for a primary down. It appeared like nothing out of the bizarre. However Ok.C. had been holding onto that play since a win over the 49ers. Which win, precisely?

Effectively … the Tremendous Bowl win in 2020.

“I do not know for those who bear in mind the play that we ran for a landing to Travis [Kelce] within the first Tremendous Bowl,” Mahomes mentioned Sunday. “Simply getting me on the sting, having a pair choices for guys to throw it to after which if [the Bills] take that away in man protection, simply use your ft and get the primary down.”

It says one thing about this play’s significance that the final time the Chiefs known as it was within the AFC Championship Recreation and within the Tremendous Bowl. 

[Prepare for the epic Eagles-Chiefs matchup on FOX Sports’ Super Bowl LIX hub]

The factor that makes it work is the play-action. When the Chiefs line up on this play on this formation, they run the ball. They do not pretend the handoff, they make the handoff. Most groups cannot afford to interrupt that tendency as soon as each 5 years. Most groups will break the tendency as soon as each few weeks. However the Chiefs appear to deal with this play with the identical care as one would possibly deal with the fireplace axe behind the glass: Break in case of emergency. Kansas Metropolis runs with the fullback or the operating again. And when — as soon as each half-decade — the Chiefs want a vital conversion, the play-action is there ready.

“You all the time add a bit of wrinkle right here and there as you go,” Reid mentioned. “We have experimented with these all the best way again to the offseason and the camp.”

Sarcastically, that wasn’t even the idea that drew probably the most consideration.

The Chiefs threw one thing extra clearly novel on the Payments: an inverted wishbone with a read-option. Of us within the media and — extra importantly — on Buffalo’s protection mentioned they’d by no means seen something prefer it.

“I did not see that in any of the breakdowns I watched,” Payments defensive finish Gregory Rousseau instructed Ty Dunne on “Go Lengthy.”

That is as a result of the Chiefs did not run the play this season.

However, um… effectively, Gregory, you even have seen it.

The Ravens ran it towards the Payments this season.

Yup, this formation got here out of Baltimore’s playbook. Reid and his employees should have watched Lamar Jackson rush for a landing from that formation on that precise play towards the Payments in Week 4, as “A to Z’s” Charles Goldman identified. Kansas Metropolis should have watched the Ravens beatdown of Buffalo and thought: Let’s strive that.

The consequence was a pair of touchdowns within the AFC Championship. (And the landing in Week 4.) 

My query is: When did Reid determine he wished to make use of that formation? As a result of the Chiefs performed the Payments in Week 11. It is totally doable Reid noticed the Ravens’ formation and put it into the playbook — solely to reserve it for the postseason.

There was one other play the Chiefs sat on. Reid mentioned he’d been saving all of it sport, and it is unclear how lengthy he’d been holding onto it earlier than that. However Henne mentioned the play was within the playbook when he obtained there in 2018.

On third-and-9 with 1:30 left, Kansas Metropolis wanted a primary right down to successfully finish the sport. And the Chiefs obtained it by checking down within the flat to Samaje Perine, who caught the ball behind the road of scrimmage, however due to professional play design and timing, managed to get the mandatory yards after the catch to clinch the win.

How did that play come collectively so completely?

Effectively, it was the play the Chiefs had been saving for that precise second. And never simply that, Reid launched a number of wrinkles — a double movement from two receivers — that clearly prevented the protection from realizing what was coming. 

“We have a look at — earlier than the sport — if it comes right down to a 3rd down or a fourth down and the sport’s on the road. The coaches speak about it. The quarterbacks speak about it. That was type of our No. 1 choice there as a go-to play for this sport,” Reid mentioned. “It was only a matter of hoping that they’d be in the appropriate protection for the play. … Matt [OC Matt Nagy] spends infinite time on that.”

It is fascinating to think about that — in a sport that tight — Reid nonetheless had his greatest play ready for him on the finish of the sport. Not each playcaller would have that self-discipline. Former Lions OC and present Bears head coach Ben Johnson, for instance, appeared to have a brand new trick play each week. However at a sure level, it was honest to wonder if the Lions would have any left for the playoffs after they wanted them most. 

Reid would possibly simply have a unique philosophy.

“He’ll dig into his pocket,” Henne mentioned. “On the proper second, that is when he actually dives down and pulls it out.”

The widespread knowledge that the Chiefs maintain out on us through the common season is kind of true and kind of not. They run what they should get the wins they want. It is simply that — with their efficiency and consistency hitting new heights — they won’t have as many moments of desperation as different groups. In flip, they won’t have to make use of that “No. 1 choice” on Reid’s play sheet. They do not merely spend them as a result of they have them.

“He does maintain on to some stuff, however on the similar time — Coach Reid, Patrick — all these guys are rivals,” Henne mentioned. “So that they’re gonna do something they’ll do to win a sport, whether or not it is common season or playoffs. However on the similar time, he all the time has one thing in his again pocket.”

There’s nonetheless loads of materials in Reid’s pocket for the Tremendous Bowl. Even with Kansas Metropolis on a streak of 17 straight wins in one-possession video games, Reid could have an idea that he is been saving for Nick Sirianni and Vic Fangio and Philly. It would come from the 1965 Sugar Bowl. It would come from the 2000 5A Division I Excessive College Championship. It would come from the Johnson Lions.

Be warned, Eagles.

Previous to becoming a member of FOX Sports activities as an NFL reporter and columnist, Henry McKenna spent seven years overlaying the Patriots for USA TODAY Sports activities Media Group and Boston Globe Media. Comply with him on Twitter at @henrycmckenna.

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