Andy Reid Talks Chiefs’ Goals For 2025

Simple but massive elements in whether an NFL team begins its season with a victory.

“Yeah, well, it’s always good to come off and get a good start for sure,” Reid said Friday. “I think all 32 of us are trying to do that, come out of the gates and play well.

“You’d better take every week as its own separate thing, and you better keep pounding as you go through the year. But you sure would like to come out and play well, I mean, for sure.”

Toenail prevented season-opening loss in 2024

The Chiefs open their 66th franchise season on Friday against the Los Angeles Chargers in São Paulo, Brazil (7 p.m. CT, YouTube, KSHB-TV 41, 96.5 The Fan). Last year, Kansas City launched its season with a toenail-size win over Baltimore – a 27-20 victory preserved after replay review showed tight end Isaiah Likely caught a last-second touchdown pass with the toe of his cleat out of bounds.

Patrick Mahomes is 10-2 in 12 career starts against the Chargers. He’s won six straight games in the series, but only one of them has been by more than one score, and none have been easy. Last year at SoFi Stadium, the quarterback lost his No. 1 wide receiver, Rashee Rice, after an accidental collision on a Kristian Fulton interception return ended Rice’s season.

Mahomes and the Chiefs needed overtime to beat the Chargers in both 2021 and 2020, both times in Los Angeles. And Justin Herbert came into Arrowhead Stadium in 2021 and beat the Chiefs, 30-24.

Averting identity crisis

One of the most intriguing questions facing the Chiefs in 2025 is their identity. Last year, they went 15-1 in games they were trying to win (they lost the meaningless season-finale at Denver after resting most of their starters for the playoffs).

But they somehow reached that mark without an explosive offense. Injuries robbed them of starting running back Isiah Pacheco and starting wide receiver Hollywood Brown, and their left-tackle position was an embarrassing turnstile.

This preseason, including four drives with Mahomes running the first-team offense (three touchdowns and a field goal), they proved that this year should be different – including a 58-yard strike to newcomer Tyquan Thornton that showed the deep ball is back in their offense. But whether they can better protect Mahomes, and whether they can establish an effective running game are questions that’ll take a few weeks to sort out.

The identity will come, however, and it could happen earlier than it takes for some clubs.

“Yeah, normally it takes a couple of weeks,” Reid said Friday. “And I think that’s probably for most teams. Now, we’ve got a lot of guys coming back, so maybe that cuts it down a little bit.

“But just to get yourself in rhythm and now you’re taking it up a notch from what you were doing in training camp. And so sometimes you got to work through that just a tick, but it should be okay there.”