How did the Bengals do it?

[Buffalo_Stampede]

9 minutes ago, Boatdrinks said:

Bills would have been crazy to play man vs Chiefs with Wallace and Jackson. Our game was about the 13 seconds. What transpired lost a game that was a win 99 times out of 100.

Yeah it's just something we can't do very well. We don't have man CBs other than Johnson. I was all about dropping 8 into coverage though, especially those final plays.

[Solomon Grundy]

13 minutes ago, Boatdrinks said:

Bills would have been crazy to play man vs Chiefs with Wallace and Jackson. Our game was about the 13 seconds. What transpired lost a game that was a win 99 times out of 100.

Apple and Iwuzee aren’t much better 

[Boatdrinks]

3 minutes ago, billsfanmiamioh said:

You must not watch many Bengals games. The local talk surrounding their resurgence is if the coaching staff will hold end up holding them back from reaching their full potential. Taylor has had many in game head scratchers including yesterday. Kicking the FG late in the game yesterday seemed insane to me and probably doesn’t work 9/10 times vs the chiefs. We would be KILLING McD if he did that. Bottom line, Bengals got lucky the Chiefs & Mahomes completely imploded. We should be pretty familiar with how that works…

I agree on the FG. Seemed like you could write in the ending after that. Bengals D made a few plays in the closing minutes and that was the difference. 

[Solomon Grundy]

8 minutes ago, Niagara Dude said:

I think the Bills need to focus on getting better talent on defensive side .  As for adjustments that Cincy made,  if you watch Mahomes's final pass and interception.  The Bengals rush 3 and have the 4th man two -three yards off the line as a spy and not allowing him to step up and either pass or run. The coverage down the field was far  tighter and it allowed the corner to get his hands on the ball and into the second defender.  Either way,  I think we can put away these ideas that the Bills need to focus on adding more offensive weapons so we can score on every possession in order to beat the Chiefs.  Get that defence stronger with more play makers and at least one stud. They put up stats because QB'S in our conference are good to average at best and we have some cupcake matchups. The Saints game alone we went against their 3rd stringer.

Sad thing is that the Bills did this in regular season win vs Chiefs although Tre was playing 

Edited January 31, 2022 by Solomon Grundy

[Boatdrinks]

1 minute ago, Solomon Grundy said:

Apple and Iwuzee aren’t much better 

Don’t know if they are or not, but Bills playing man vs KC ? I can only imagine the meltdown on this board. Might’ve needed to score 50 in that one. 

2 minutes ago, Solomon Grundy said:

Sad thing is that the Bills did this in regular season win vs Chiefs 

Maybe no Tre White changed their plans. Anyway the Bills lost it in the 13 seconds. 

[Livinginthepast]

2 hours ago, Buffalo_Stampede said:

Burrow reminds me of Tom Brady.

He reminds me a lot of McCauley Caulkin!

[Magox]

Bottom line, the Bills were good enough to beat the Chiefs and possibly win the superbowl under it's current construct if it weren't for the last 13 seconds, which if the Bills were to have the same situation 10 more times, they most likely win all 10 of those games.

 

With that said, the more I think about it the more it makes sense to play Mahomes on obvious passing situations with 3 pass rushers and one spy, and the spy should never look to have his hands up so that he gets juked with the pass attempt by Mahomes and his only job is to drop back, Spy and take out any passes in his area and when the moment presents itself, to go in like a heat seeking missile on Mahomes.

 

That should be part of the blue print, along with two deep safety play.

[BarleyNY]

11 hours ago, Awwufelloff said:

How did the Bengals hold the Chiefs to 3 pts after halftime which included OT in which KC won the toss? How were they able to do something we couldn't?

The Bengals did something to Mahomes that I thought we’d see employed against Allen this season, but really didn’t.  They regularly rushed three and used a fourth in a multiple role.  First he dropped into a short zone and took away the quick slant while he also played spy.  Then he often rushed late when the short middle cleared out and/or he had a clear path to Mahomes.  I need to watch it again and see what else they did.  Refs were letting the OLs and defense hold a lot which helped Cincy’s coverage.  Rushing 3 made a lot of sense too since the OL holding was slowing up the rush anyway.

[Evian]

The Bengals get the most out of their talent. They are extremely well coached. 3 post season games all decided by 1 score. They won them all.

 

The Bills are the exact opposite. They regularly lost to teams with inferior talent and could not win a single close game. Not a single one in 6 tries.

 

You can't win 3 or 4 straight playoff games with coaches that can't coach under pressure. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[YoloinOhio]

They didn’t do anything in the 1st half - chiefs had 21 pts, 292 yards and no turnovers or sacks. but in the 2nd half the cincy defense rushed 3, dropped 8 and put a spy on Mahomes. 

 

Whether it was result of their D of not, Mahomes reverted to the hero ball he was playing with the first part of the season when they started 3-4. That was how the Bills D beat him in October. He was chasing big plays instead of playing smart football and he took bad sacks and turned tHe ball over. He made poor decisions and yesterday’s loss is 100% on him. He took 2 sacks with a 3 man rush on the final 2 plays of regulation. They were 1st and goal on the 5 and ended up kicking a FG on 4th and 26! 

Edited January 31, 2022 by YoloinOhio

[Dkollidas]

Gotta keep adding pass rushers and defensive linemen in general. 
 

if they have a chance at a guy like Jordan Davis, he would allow them to run a 3 man front more often, and would take double teams away from Ed Oliver. 

[Best Williams Available]

9 hours ago, Buffalo Barbarian said:

 

Not sure if he mentally fell apart but was pressing too hard and started making errors.

 

 

Wasn’t he like 6/24 passing in 2nd half? For him that’s a complete breakdown. 

[Buffalo716]

1 hour ago, Evian said:

The Bengals get the most out of their talent. They are extremely well coached. 3 post season games all decided by 1 score. They won them all.

 

The Bills are the exact opposite. They regularly lost to teams with inferior talent and could not win a single close game. Not a single one in 6 tries.

 

You can't win 3 or 4 straight playoff games with coaches that can't coach under pressure. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yea we were only like 6-0 in 1 score games last year and playoffs 4 out of 5 

 

We are still a much better team than the Bengals... We took the sail out of the cheifs and they took advantage 

 

McDermott routinely outcoached teams and took a terribly mediocre team with little talent and TT as his QB and took us to the playoffs 

 

That was a miracle coaching job and he is routinely growing as a coach which is not debatable

[JÂy RÛßeÒ]

Their D, ranked 17th in the league, outperformed our #1 ranked D, especially in overtime.  A few factors I think:
 

1. Coaching.  They didn't panic, didn't flinch, and were in the right calls for the situation.  They adjusted at the half down 21-3.
2. Fundamentals.  They tackled.  We gave up 225 YAC on 33 completions.  They allowed only 275 yards total.
3. Scheme. 
   1. They handled Mahomes correctly:
      1. Their D only had 13 picks all year, but they picked off Mahomes twice.  We had 0 picks.
      2. They sacked him 4 times and hit him another 5.  We had 2 and 2.
      3. They held him to 19 rushing yards, compared to 69 we gave up.
      4. They dropped 8 into coverage on 35% of plays, coming away with a pick and 2 sacks on those plays while holding Mahomes to 7-13-59.
   2. They got off the field, allowing 2 fewer 3rd down conversions than we did.
   3. They didn't let Hill and Kelce beat them.   
      1. Combined, they were targeted 22 times against us for 19 completions, 246 yards, and 2 TDs.  On 21 targets yesterday, they had 17 completions but only 173 yards with 2 TDs
      2. Tyreek Hill in the 2nd half - no receptions!
4. Condition.  They hadn't been in the track meet with KC's offense like ours was, chasing their QB and their WRs all game.  So they were not gassed like ours was.  They had 36 minutes of possession.  We had 27.
5. Personnel.  They weren't missing their top cover corner.

 

It sure didn't hurt that the Chiefs thought they had the game won and played like it.

Edited January 31, 2022 by JÂy RÛßeÒ

[TH3]

Good Lord…Mahomes went average at 29.55 of first half and that was the bigger part

[zow2]

I loved the way Cinci handled the OT.  Sure KC tied it on a final play FG. Sure KC won the coin toss, and all the Arrowhead fans roared as if they won the game right there.   But Cincinnati covered the kickoff, then punched KC right in the mouth...3 and out (final play being an INT).  Goodnight Chiefs.  That was handled so professionally by the CInci coaches and defensive players. I was envious.

[JohnNord]

21 minutes ago, JÂy RÛßeÒ said:

Their D, ranked 17th in the league, outperformed our #1 ranked D, especially in overtime.  A few factors I think:
 

1. Coaching.  They didn't panic, didn't flinch, and were in the right calls for the situation.  They adjusted at the half down 21-3.
2. Fundamentals.  They tackled.  We gave up 225 YAC on 33 completions.  They allowed only 275 yards total.
3. Scheme. 
   1. They handled Mahomes correctly:
      1. Their D only had 13 picks all year, but they picked off Mahomes twice.  We had 0 picks.
      2. They sacked him 4 times and hit him another 5.  We had 2 and 2.
      3. They held him to 19 rushing yards, compared to 69 we gave up.
      4. They dropped 8 into coverage on 35% of plays, coming away with a pick and 2 sacks on those plays while holding Mahomes to 7-13-59.
   2. They got off the field, allowing 2 fewer 3rd down conversions than we did.
   3. They didn't let Hill and Kelce beat them.   
      1. Combined, they were targeted 22 times against us for 19 completions, 246 yards, and 2 TDs.  On 21 targets yesterday, they had 17 completions but only 173 yards with 2 TDs
      2. Tyreek Hill in the 2nd half - no receptions!
4. Condition.  They hadn't been in the track meet with KC's offense like ours was, chasing their QB and their WRs all game.  So they were not gassed like ours was.  They had 36 minutes of possession.  We had 27.
5. Personnel.  They weren't missing their top cover corner.

 

It sure didn't hurt that the Chiefs thought they had the game won and played like it.

I will agree with a lot of what you wrote but I have to add that this was a game of matchups.  The Bengals defense stacked up well against KC because they have a strong defensive line that was winning their matchups.  They got pressure on Mahomes but brought him down.

 

The other things that changed in the 2nd half was that the corners were playing bump and run and were aggressive in their coverage.  Again taking advantage of a matchup.   

[dma0034]

They hit Mahomes. That is the difference. Make no mistake about it: the D-Line is what screwed the Bills last week. Could have easily stopped the Cheifs their first 2 drives with wrapping him up, instead they let him run. 

 

 

I will also say there are always fluke plays that happen. Last week the ball was tipped once and hit the ground a second too early. When players put their hands up Mahomes waited last week. This week tipped ball get intercepted because a defender put his hands up. 

[bmur66]

They didn't bend and break.

[Process]

16 minutes ago, TH3 said:

Good Lord…Mahomes went average at 29.55 of first half and that was the bigger part

If mahomes played average or even close to it, the Chiefs are in the Superbowl