Imagine the first half Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes would have had at Oakland if he had Tyreek Hill in the lineup.
Without Hill, his best receiver who is out with a shoulder injury, Mahomes still threw for 313 yards and four touchdowns before halftime. In the first 11 games of Week 2, the only quarterbacks to throw for more than 313 yards over an entire game were Arizona Cardinals rookie Kyler Murray and Cam Newton of the Carolina Panthers.
Mahomes, the 2018 NFL MVP, is pretty good. The Chiefs didn’t continue to steamroll the Raiders in the second half, but won 28-10.
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The Chiefs started in a 10-0 hole before Mahomes got white hot. None of his touchdowns were cheap ones. He threw a 44-yard score to Demarcus Robinson, a 42-yard touchdown to Mecole Hardman, a perfectly placed ball to Travis Kelce for a 27-yard score and then Robinson made a nice play for a 39-yard touchdown.
All 4 of Patrick Mahomes' touchdowns in the 2nd quarter came on deep attempts (20+ air yards).
— Next Gen Stats (@NextGenStats) September 15, 2019
Since 2016, only one other QB has thrown as many deep passing touchdowns in a single game (Jared Goff in Week 4, 2018).
Mahomes did it in a quarter.#KCvsOAK | #ChiefsKingdom pic.twitter.com/4m1giZXKjx
Not that anyone thought Mahomes would struggle much without Hill, but not many quarterbacks could lose one of the NFL’s best receivers and keep going at a record pace.
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Frank Schwab is a writer for Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at shutdown.corner@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter! Follow @YahooSchwab
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