Mahomes, Kansas City Chiefs Routine Against Deshaun Watson and Houston Texans, 34-20

Kansas City Chiefs demonstrated their strength in the opening game of the season, defeating the Houston Texans. The Super Bowl champions rallied back after a slow first quarter to win, 34-20.

As in the Divisional Round last year, the Texans drew the first blood, but in the aftermath, they were the ones left in the dust. Patrick Mahomes and the young rookie RB Clyde Edwards-Helaire led the hosts, who were looking pretty dominant against one of the better teams in their conference.

“Obviously, our players, both sides of the ball and special teams, I thought they were solid,” Andy Reid said. “For the first game there were some good things that were done, some great individual performances.”

When mentioning individual performances, Patrick Mahome had three touchdown passes and 211 yards. The highest-paid player in the history of the league was pretty routine while handling the Texans, without any problems during the entire game.

Meanwhile, the final selection of the first round in this year’s draft, Clyde Edwards-Helaire, amazed everyone. The young running back rushed for 138 yards and one touchdown. That score was pretty impressive, 27 yards long, with several excellent moves provided by the 21-year old. He became the youngest guy in the NFL history to have 130+ yards and a TD on a debut. Texans’ head coach Bill O’Brien admitted that his side had a lot of problems with defending the ground game.

“We had trouble stopping the run, trouble getting off the field, and then we sustain the second drive of the game for a touchdown,” he said.

The contests started with the Texans taking the lead. Their running back, David Johnson, rushed for 19 yards to score in his first appearance for the franchise from Texas. Johnson landed from Arizona Cardinals in a trade that involved DeAndre Hopkins. His touchdown turned out to be Houston’s only thing worth mentioning in the first half.

Mahomes quickly changed the situation on the field of the Arrowhead Stadium. Shortly after the start of the second period, he connected with Kelce for a 6-yard TD. As time went by, the hosts increased the intensity of the play, with their defense being very productive. After stopping Deshaun Watson, the Chiefs gained confidence, and they scored one TD (Sammy Watkins) and FG (Harrison Butker) until the end of the sequence.

Edwards-Helaire’s touchdown took place in the third quarter, while Tyreek Hill caught his TD pass early in the fourth.

Houston snapped a little bit midway through the last, with two touchdowns. Watson found Jordan Akins in the end zone with a 19-yarder, and the Texans’ quarterback later rushed for another score. Still, that wasn’t enough to endanger the hosts who closed the game without any problems. Furthermore, Butker added another field goal with 0:30 to go.

Watson was picked once; had one TD pass, and a rushing score while throwing for 253 yards, 20-for-32. Johnson had a promising debut, generating 77 yards on 11 carries and 32 yards receiving after 3 catches. Will Fuller was Watson’s favorite target with 8 receptions for 112 yards. But the problem was he didn’t have any support.

Among the Chiefs, Sammy Watkins caught 82 yards, Travis Kelce 50, Tyreek Hill 42. The interesting thing is that the Chiefs’ attack was far more productive than the Texans’ as they had just nine yards more than the guests 369-360.

Week 2 features the Chiefs in LA clashing the Rams at the newly built SoFi stadium. The Texans will search the first win of the season at home against the reigning MVP Lamar Jackson and the Baltimore Ravens.