The Chiefs broke the Jaguars with their pass rush, then swept up the pieces

Or, sometimes, the mere threat of the pass rush. Jacksonville couldn’t set up deep shots and hardly tried — until it was too late.

In the 2022 NFL regular season, Trevor Lawrence’s average pass traveled 7.4 yards downfield — 22nd best among 33 starting quarterbacks. His 55 deep balls, however, were more than all but 10 other passers this fall.

Yet 45 minutes into his Divisional Round showdown with the Kansas City Chiefs, he’d thrown just one pass that traveled more than 15 yards against the league’s 20th-ranked pass defense (it was a 50-yard rainbow. That Christian Kirk dropped, but that’s beside the point). That’s how, after three quarters with a hobbled Patrick Mahomes and a better-than-expected effort from their defense, the Jaguars trailed 20-10.

This wasn’t the main narrative of Kansas City’s 27-20 win. It had Mahomes limping back to the field after a first half ankle injury, Travis Kelce earning a month’s worth of targets and a 98-yard Chad Henne drive (boosted by rookie seventh-rounder Isiah Pacheco) with which to compete. Even so, an important theme remained.

The Chiefs and defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo found ways to bring pressure on seemingly every passing down. The Jaguars and head coach Doug Pederson worked around it as long as they could. They lost as a result.

This wasn’t unexpected. The Chiefs spent 2022 injecting chaos into the pocket. Their 24.9 percent pressure rate ranked fifth in the NFL. Their 55 sacks were second most. Pederson knew this and tailored his offense around it. To a fault.

Lawrence engineered a conservative passing game seven days after throwing four first half interceptions against the Los Angeles Chargers. His average target depth dipped to 5.0 yards in the first three quarters. His average time to throw was a mere 2.51 seconds — below his season-long 2.59, which was already fourth-lowest in the league.

via RBSDM.com

10 of his 24 completions came at or behind his own line of scrimmage. He’d only had four such completions last week vs. the Chargers 21st-ranked pressure rate.

Per the NFL’s Next Gen Stats, Lawrence’s 10.8 percent aggression rate — the rate at which he threw into tight coverage — was also fourth-lowest among quarterbacks. It was a season-high 27.7 percent in last week’s comeback effort against the Chargers, showcasing the clutch throws he made in a historic rally. But in Kansas City that number dropped to 2.9 percent for an offense that wanted nothing to do with big throws early.

The Jaguars attempted two passes that traveled further than 14 yards downfield in the first three quarters. He had seven in the fourth quarter. Some of that was because he was trailing by two possessions and battling an hourglass that said “PLAYOFF EXISTENCE” in big letters down the side. But a much bigger part was Spagnuolo’s defense, which found a way to punish Lawrence whenever he set his feet and looked off into the distance.

Kansas City had pressure in Lawrence’s face all night. Pederson was able to plan around this to the tune of only two sacks and seven quarterback hits, but wasn’t able to turn that into sustained drives and meaningful points. Jacksonville’s answer to the Chiefs’ constant pressure was to get the ball to its playmakers near the line of scrimmage and hope they would make plays.

They did not.

Lawrence’s top two targets, Christian Kirk and Evan Engram, combined for 12 catches and only 83 yards — a meager 4.2 yards per target and 6.9 per catch. This pressure finally became fatal in the final quarter once the second-year QB had no choice but to throw downfield. A 25-yard end zone shot to Marvin Jones should have been intercepted. A rushed loft to Zay Jones one drive later was.

Kansas City will always be defined by Mahomes’ play behind center. But Spagnuolo’s defense put together a gameplan that made winning possible even if a 37-year-old Henne had to take the field for more than two drives.

That’s a scary proposition for whomever survives Sunday’s Cincinnati Bengals-Buffalo Bills game. Beating the Chiefs doesn’t just mean limiting its MVP quarterback; it also means finding a way around the pass rush that hog-tied the Jags passing game through most of the Divisional Round.

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