Both sides of the ball struggled for the Kansas City Chiefs in the team’s 30-21 loss to the Buffalo Bills on Sunday. In KC’s first defeat of the 2024 NFL season, the early story of the game was rookie wide receiver Xavier Worthy. Worthy caught four passes for 61 yards and a touchdown on the Chiefs’ third drive of the game, setting up a potential breakout performance for the young speedster. Then, he didn’t catch another pass.
Worthy was targeted only one time after that drive on Sunday, and his missed connection earned more postgame discussion than his high-octane drive.
In the second quarter, on the drive immediately following the one that relied on Worthy so heavily, Mahomes attempted a deep pass to Worthy near the left sideline. Worthy was wide open, but as he tracked the ball, he dragged his right foot, caught the ball, landed on his right foot, and landed with his left foot out of bounds.
Xavier Worthy dragged his foot before he caught the ball, would have been a huge play pic.twitter.com/95lFV2IAKU
— Tedd Buddwell 🏀🏈 (@TedBuddy8) November 17, 2024
If Worthy had dragged his left foot after securing the football, the Chiefs would have had another explosive play on a drive that resulted in a three-and-out following the miss.
After the game, Chiefs head coach Andy Reid mentioned Worthy’s big day and the sideline mishap in his opening comments after the game.
“Worthy and [tight end] Noah [Gray] had good days,” Reid said. “Worthy will learn from the one on the sideline, we’ll have to take a peek at it on tape to see exactly what happened, but we were close on that one, on the deep ball.”
Later during his press conference, Reid was specifically asked about the near-connection.
“He’ll get better at those, and then we’ll get him the ball a little quicker as we go on them,” Reid said. “I’ve got to see it. We’re going to look at it on tape and see exactly if he was able to drag his foot, if that was possible. If that’s the case, then he can learn from that, yeah.”
Quarterback Patrick Mahomes had a more straightforward approach when he spoke to media after the game.
“It’s probably just me throwing it more in bounds to the guy that’s wide open for a touchdown,” Mahomes said. “If I throw it in bounds, it’s a walk-in touchdown. I just have to be better there.”
Did Worthy need to make this play? Yes, 100%.
But he’s in a different time zone than the defenders. How is this ball put that close to the sideline here? It’s a walk in TD with a better pass. https://t.co/ASWI7SsvUH pic.twitter.com/akUvOm5yLJ
— ChiefsStan (@chiefs_stan) November 18, 2024
The Mahomes-to-Worthy connection has been inconsistent during Worthy’s rookie campaign, with plenty of blame to go around. In last week’s win over the Denver Broncos, Mahomes missed a would-be touchdown due to in inaccurate throw that led Worthy out of bounds, making the pass uncatchable. The week prior, Worthy ran himself out of bounds and turned another nearly sure-fire score into a long incompletion.
