Patrick Mahomes passed for 320 yards and three touchdowns and the Kansas City Chiefs finished as the top seed in the AFC for the fourth time in seven seasons with a 29-10 win. Pittsburgh Steelers on Wednesday
The two-time Super Bowl champions raced to an early 13-point lead and were never really threatened by the Steelers (10-6), who dropped three straight as their chances of capturing the AFC North took another hit.
Mahomes connected on first-half scoring drives to Xavier Worth and Justin Watson and Kansas City’s defense did most of the rest, including perennial All-Pro defensive end Chris Jones sitting out while nursing a calf injury. The Chiefs sacked Russell Wilson five times, forced two turnovers and was barely seen playing for the third day in 11 days.
Travis Kelce caught eight passes for 84 yards while becoming the third tight end NFL history at 1,000 receptions, joining Hall of Famer Tony Gonzalez and Jason Witten. Kelce sealed Kansas City’s fifth straight victory with a 12-yard touchdown catch early in the fourth quarter.
The 35-year-old celebrated with a dark ball over the goal post, which drew a foul and groans from the crowd at the Acrisure Stadium, who used to watch Mohamed play with his country’s team. Mahomes is now 4-0 on the road against the Steelers, with 17 touchdowns against one interception.
Russell Wilson throws for 250 yards for Pittsburgh. George Pickens finished with three receptions for 50 yards after missing three games with a hamstring injury. It wasn’t nearly enough for the Steelers, who went 0-3 during a brutal three-game stretch against Super Bowl contenders Philadelphia, Baltimore and Kansas City.
Perhaps more annoying than the losses is just playing. The Steelers lost every game by at least 14 points and could start on the road to the playoffs after they had a fast-and-loose two-game division lead three weeks ago.
Mahomes, who suffered an ankle injury against Cleveland, led the way for touchdowns on the first two drives, finding Worthy down the field for seven hundred and twenty yards and hitting Watson in the back corner of the end zone to make it 13 -0.
One series late in the first quarter marked a frustrating day for Pittsburgh. A holding penalty was negated on a short touchdown run by Jaylen Warren and Wilson threw into triple coverage in the end zone to break up. Kansas City’s Justin Reid had little trouble grabbing it to end the threat.
The Steelers got within six twice at 13-7 and 16-10, but never had the ball with a chance to take a lead in the second half. But the leaders – who spent most of the first three months of the season burning for several weeks – were methodically torn apart.
Kareem Hunte ran in from 2 yards out for the first touchdown of the quarter to make it 22-10. Pat Freiermuth then fumbled on Pittsburgh’s next possession. Kansas City linebacker Nick Bolton fell on it and Mahomes put just four plays away for a floating pass to a wide open Kelce.
NFL vehicles except for Christmas kicks off glitch
Mariah Carey opened Wednesday’s doubleheader with a tape performance of All I Want for Christmas is You before Mahomes, Kelce and the Chiefs kick against the Steelers.
Houston Ravens and the host Baltimore Ravens in the second game as the NFL showcases four of the AFC’s top five teams.
Netflix agreed to a three-year contract in May to broadcast Christmas games. The streaming giant is expecting one of its biggest days since the site was launched in 1998.
Netflix’s 282.3m subscribers can stream games in more than 190 countries, the first time a single outlet has globally distributed an NFL game. Netflix has games available in five languages - English, French, Spanish, Portuguese and German.
Netflix Mike Tyson-Jake Paul fight had problems streaming on the 14th of November. Bilateral accounts for 65m contiguous streams, including 38m contiguous streams in the United States. According to the Down Detector website, nearly 85,000 viewers are experiencing start-up problems with outages or streaming up to and including the battle.
There were no signs of trouble Wednesday morning in the game after two errors during the pregame. It opened with about 10 seconds of silence because studio host Kay Adams’ microphone was not turned on.
The biggest test will come at halftime of the Ravens-Texans game Beyonce He does it live at NRG Stadium.
According to NFL Media, viewers in all 50 states tuned in within minutes of the pregame show live and viewers from nearly 200 countries watched the lead up to kickoff.
The NFL plays its first games on Wednesday with the Steelers and Ravens forced to play on December 2, 2020 due to the Covid-19 pandemic. The only other time the league played on a Wednesday since 1948 was in 2012 when the Giants and Cowboys met in the opener.