The Kansas City Chiefs faced a tall task after giving up a late touchdown against the Jacksonville Jaguars on Monday, and it grew even more difficult after an unusual mistake from quarterback Patrick Mahomes — on a rare call.
Mahomes and the Chiefs had 23 seconds left and three timeouts remaining when they got the ball trailing by three points in Monday’s game. The team sputtered, burning a timeout after a short gain before Mahomes used another timeout as the play clock was set to expire on the following play.
That led to a rare penalty for the Chiefs and sparked some criticism for Mahomes.
Patrick Mahomes Suffered Rare Mistake
The timeout from Mahomes drew an automatic penalty for delay of game, as NFL teams are not allowed to call consecutive timeouts on the same play. That led to some criticism of Mahomes for apparently not knowing the rule and for pushing his team back.
“The back to back timeout penalty is so good man. Mahomes completely out of it,” one fans wrote on X.
Mahomes wasn’t the only one taking blame for the late mistake. Others took aim at Chiefs head coach Andy Reid for his failure to manage the clock better.
“Andy Reidâs late game clock management failures returning in the form of a 5 yard penalty for taking back-to-back timeouts cost Mahomes from reaching the end zone on the hail mary,” one person shared in a post on X.
The game ended one play later when a Hail Mary heave from Mahomes fell incomplete — and close to 20 yards short of the endzone. The Jaguars won 31-28, sending the Chiefs to 2-3.
Patrick Mahomes Faces More Criticism
The late penalty was not the only mistake from Mahomes, who also threw a red zone interception that Jaguars linebacker Devin Lloyd returned 99 yards for the go-ahead touchdown.
As Kristen Wong from SI.com noted, Mahomes also took some criticism for his behavior after the game-turning play.
The Chiefs quarterback tried to tackle Lloyd after his bad throw, but Lloyd easily jumped over Mahomes’s low dive. After Lloyd shook off a few other Chiefs players and ran in for the defensive touchdown, cameras panned to Mahomes, who had a blank look on his face and strangely started clapping,” Wong wrote.
Wong noted that many fans criticized Mahomes for the actions.
“While some fans speculated that Mahomes clapped to classily pay respects to Lloyd’s incredible run, others were baffled as to what Mahomes was trying to convey,” Wong wrote.
Mahomes expressed frustration with his team’s play, telling reporters after the game that they made too many mistakes and failed to hold an early lead. The Chiefs quarterback pointed to his own mistakes in the remarks.
“Obviously it sucks,” Mahomes told reporters after the game. “You let a game slip away. It sucks when you get a lead like that and you’re not able to hold it the rest of the game. We crush ourselves with penalties and mistakes and interceptions. We’ve done that to ourselves all year long. We’ve got to be better. We’ve lost too many games already.”
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