Exploring Buffalo’s Potential to Finally Overcome Chiefs in AFC Playoffs

Arrowhead Stadium isn’t friendly to visiting quarterbacks, especially those who just lost the AFC Championship Game. The NFL’s third-oldest facility has the worst visitors’ locker room and postgame media accommodations, and the league MVP, Josh Allen, is treated like any other opposing quarterback.

“Watching him go from the press conference area on that long walk down that narrow hall,” beat writer Joe Buscaglia said on Tuesday’s edition of the Scoop City podcast, “that long hallway back over to the visitors' locker room, I'll never forget it. It just looked like he wasn't there, even though he was walking.

“So, I think that's going to stick with him. And that, to me, is as good of a motivator as any.”

But did the Bills do enough this offseason to finally overcome their playoff nemesis, the Chiefs? Buscaglia said Buffalo’s limited cap space forced them to be efficient in free agency, where they added Joshua Palmer and Joey Bosa.

“And if that doesn't pan out,” Buscaglia said, referring to Bosa, “that's going to be a tough one because one of their biggest defensive downfalls last year was they couldn't get heat on the opposing quarterback when it mattered.”

It mattered in the AFC title contest when Mahomes completed a 23-yard pass to Xavier Worthy in a tie game with four minutes left in regulation. The play gave Kansas City first-and-goal from the 10 and set up Harrison Butker’s game-winning 35-yard field goal. Buscaglia said the lack of pressure forced Buffalo’s defense to enter uncomfortable territory.

Almost exclusively a zone-coverage defense, the Bills pivoted to man coverage with plenty of blitz in the AFC divisional playoffs. That strategy shut down Lamar Jackson both on the ground and in the air.

But against Mahomes a week later, the Bills allowed Kansas City to match a season high with 28 first downs. Buscaglia said losing cornerback Christian Benford to a concussion early in the game was a key factor.

“It did not work whatsoever,” Buscaglia said. “In comes Kaiir Elam. Elam was kind of a disaster of a first-round pick, and it just didn't go well for him or them. They just couldn't sustainably play man coverage against that team in that spot without any heat on the quarterback, and that's what we saw happen.”

What happens this year between the Bills and Chiefs is highly anticipated. While another postseason meeting seems like a foregone conclusion, they’ll definitely meet on Nov. 2, when Kansas City makes another mid-season trip to Highmark Stadium in Week 9. It’s a short week for the Chiefs, following a Monday night date with Jayden Daniels and the Commanders.

Benford should be back for that game, but Elam won’t. Buffalo traded him to Dallas. With or without Benford, Allen and the Bills have had few issues overcoming Kansas City in regular-season games, in which Allen is 4-1 against Patrick Mahomes with four straight victories.

Postseason has been the Bills’ impregnable obstacle, though. Mahomes is 4-0 in playoff games against Allen, including that 2024 AFC title game. Each of the Chiefs’ last three postseason wins over Buffalo has been by six points or fewer.

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