Chiefs' Pacheco Makes Bold Declaration in Brazil

“For me, I'm on revenge tour,” Pacheco said Thursday morning from Brazil. “If you know what revenge means, you know what a tour is. I'm on revenge tour. That's my goal, and that's the accountability I'm coming to the table with, bringing to the leadership.”

Defense tackle Chris Jones, sitting a couple chairs to Pacheco’s right, was fired up.

“Let's gooooo,” Jones responded. “We need him on a revenge tour.”

Genesis of motivation

Pacheco’s motivation might originate from people looking down on him for his draft pedigree, a seventh-round selection in 2022. He’s also entering the final year of his rookie contract without an extension.

Or, his quest for retribution might come from how life treated him a year ago this month. In the Chiefs’ second game last season, trailing Cincinnati 25-23 just after the final two-minute warning late in the contest, Pacheco took a handoff for 1 yard up the middle.

But as Germaine Pratt and Jay Tufele converged on Pacheco’s waist, linebacker Logan Wilson had him around the leg. The running back limped off the field and sat on the sideline as athletic trainers attended to him.

Harrison Butker kicked a walk-off field goal seven plays later, but the victory was costly for the Chiefs. Pacheco would undergo surgery on a fractured fibula and miss 10 games. And when he returned for the final four games and the run to the Super Bowl, he just wasn’t the same.

Much more explosive this year

But so far, during the preseason at least, he’s looked more explosive than he did even before the leg injury. In fact, Arrowhead Stadium held its collective breath in the preseason finale at Chicago when he hit the wall at full speed on a first-quarter run, unable to hit the brakes as he slipped.

And even Jones, a defensive tackle, knows how much a revenge-tour Pacheco will help the Chiefs, especially when they use play-action.

The play-action pass is important because it offers a boost to the Chiefs’ offense, especially opening the deep ball. Patrick Mahomes when using play-action has a 108.6 career passer rating and 8.3 yards per attempt. Without play-action, Mahomes’ respective career marks are just 100.7 and 7.6.

And play-action becomes effective when Pacheco is cashing in the receipts he’s apparently saved from earlier in his career, cashing in explosive runs.