- WHERE: GEHA Field at Arrowhead Stadium (Kansas City, Mo.)
- WHEN: 8:15 p.m. ET | ESPN, ESPN2, ESPN Deportes, NFL+
Monday night’s matchup pits together two teams currently on opposite trajectories.
Kansas City will kick off November having won every game since a Christmas Day defeat in 2023, including four playoff matchups and all seven contests so far this season to stand as the NFL’s lone unbeaten team.
Thanks to their winning ways, the Chiefs hold their conference's No. 1 seed and a multi-game lead in the AFC West as they continue building momentum in the quest for a ninth consecutive division crown.
The Buccaneers, winners of three straight NFC South titles, find themselves in a more precarious position playing .500 ball halfway through the campaign.
Tampa Bay has dropped two in a row and also lost twice to the division-leading Atlanta Falcons in the month of October. Now, before the Bucs can get to their Week 11 bye to regroup for a stretch run, they must go through last season’s two Super Bowl representatives, the Chiefs and the San Francisco 49ers.
Can they find a way to steal a victory against the defending champs, or will Kansas City keep rolling at home?
Here are four things to watch for when the Buccaneers visit the Chiefs on Monday night on ESPN and NFL+:
1) Baker looks to keep cooking. A little faith goes a long way, something Tampa Bay has found out after keeping Baker Mayfield around on a three-year contract over the offseason. The 29-year-old’s been nothing short of electric for the Bucs as the orchestrator of an offense ranked fourth in both yards and scoring. He leads the NFL with 21 passing touchdowns and is second with 2,189 passing yards, and if he can throw three-plus TDs against K.C. on Monday becomes just the seventh quarterback since 1970 to do so in five straight games. He should have plenty of opportunity to make it happen -- even after losing wide receivers Chris Godwin and Mike Evans to injury in Week 7, Mayfield still threw 50 times in Week 8. It marked his third game of the season with 45-plus pass attempts. Despite his successes, such volume does not come without drawbacks. Mayfield is also tied for the league lead with nine interceptions, seven of which have come in the past three weeks. If he’s to exploit the Chiefs with a pass-catching cast missing its stars, he must go heavy on heroics and light on mistakes.
2) Does Mahomes have a get-right game in him? Mayfield is joined atop the interception leaderboard by two others: Green Bay’s Jordan Love and his upcoming opponent, Patrick Mahomes. The two-time Most Valuable Player has perhaps never played worse statistically, and yet the Chiefs could end this week’s slate of games having never won more. If Kansas City takes down Tampa Bay, it will set a new franchise record with 14 consecutive wins. Thanks to a suffocating championship defense, Mahomes now mainly manages games, sprinkling just enough magic at the opportune moments rather than seemingly every drive as he did several seasons prior. The lack of difference-making wideouts and an aging primary weapon in tight end Travis Kelce has simply led to K.C.'s offense being a grind. Mahomes has thrown just eight touchdowns, on pace for the first sub-20 TD season of his career; he's tossed at least one pick in every game and his 84.9 passer rating is easily his lowest since becoming a starter in 2018. However, playing the Bucs could open the door for a vintage performance considering Tampa Bay has allowed the fourth-most passing yards and sixth-most passing TDs in the NFL. Coupled with Mayfield’s proclivity for lighting up scoreboards, Mahomes of old might need to pop in for a prolonged visit.
3) Ground game versus ground D. Tampa Bay’s best chance to move the ball consistently should come through the air, especially using Cade Otton against a defense that’s allowing an NFL-worst seven receptions and 80.9 receiving yards per game to tight ends this season. Otton was just above those numbers last week, with nine catches for 81 yards, while adding two scores. The offensive assault can’t be completely aerial, though. The Buccaneers must still establish balance, which means poking holes in Kansas City’s top-ranked rushing defense in terms of yards allowed to running backs per game (50.4). That task will fall to the only rushing trio in the league to each have over 175 rushing yards in 2024 -- Rachaad White, Bucky Irving and Sean Tucker. Irving’s the toughest runner of them all. He packs the gusto to make room where there isn’t any, while Tucker can fill in similarly should Irving (toe; questionable) have limitations and White remains ever-dangerous taking dump offs. Few RBs have found success against the Chiefs going it alone, but perhaps a complementary group of them can.
4) Chiefs' acquisitions aim to make their mark. Rashee Rice hasn’t played since sustaining a season-ending knee injury in Week 4 and hasn’t seen a target since Week 3. Guess who still leads all Chiefs wide receivers in both receptions and receiving yards. (It's Rice.) That’s partly why Kansas City acquired three-time All-Pro DeAndre Hopkins from the Titans on Oct. 23. Hopkins understandably played just 32.4 percent of offensive snaps in his Kansas City debut against the Raiders, hauling in two catches for 29 yards, but he should become more involved with each passing week. Although Hopkins, 32, isn’t necessarily the offensive dynamo he once was, he still has tremendous hands and a knack for getting open. Now teammates with Kelce, the two are tied for most receptions among active players (945). They'll be the foundation for Kansas City's passing game moving forward. The Chiefs didn't rest on their laurels the week after acquiring Hopkins, though. On Monday, they went out and traded for Josh Uche to bolster a pass rush that's been lacking. Kansas City has tallied 15 sacks thus far in 2024, more than only six other teams and something the 26-year-old former Patriot could help remedy. Only two years removed from a campaign with double-digit sacks, Uche won't need to acclimate himself too much to pin his ears back on obvious passing downs in the Week 9 finale.
