Year 2 is ‘Enormous’ for Chiefs' Xavier Worthy

Lost in Kansas City’s blowout Super Bowl loss against the Philadelphia Eagles was arguably the best pass of Patrick Mahomes’ 2024 season.

Down 40-14 just after the two-minute warning, with most of the 128 million viewers no longer viewing, Mahomes hit Xavier Worthy in perfect stride on a 50-yard touchdown. The quarterback finally got good protection, allowing him to send the pass 67 yards through the air and beat two Eagles defenders. Worthy showed his enticing speed down the left hash.

Worthy’s 157 yards and two touchdowns on eight catches (eight targets) in the Super Bowl may have a carry-over effect into 2025. ESPN analyst Ben Solak thinks Year 2 is enormous for the young receiver.

“Sure, most of that was in garbage time,” Solak wrote, “but it doesn't change the fact that the Chiefs got one quick, fleeting glimpse at the Worthy they had hoped they drafted.”

They drafted the blazing Worthy in the first round last season expecting him to complement Rashee Rice and Hollywood Brown, not replace them. With both players healthy and back from injury this year, Worthy will finally get to fill that role. It was a struggle in 2024.

“Necessity became the mother of invention,” Solak wrote, “and as the Chiefs' running game plummeted in effectiveness, they began using Worthy as an underneath target and even a ball carrier on reverses and jet sweeps to create some easy explosives while also moving the sticks.

“Entering the Super Bowl, the Worthy role felt clear: screens, sweeps, reverses and shallow crosses. Get the ball into his hands and use his acceleration -- not his deep speed -- as an asset to break defenders' tackle angles and create first downs.”

Solak said that before he put up big numbers in the Super Bowl, Worthy struggled to find the football in the air and catch it through contact. Rice’s return will allow Mahomes to target the veteran for more of the shallow and intermediate targets, which will free up Worthy for shots like the one he caught at the end of the Super Bowl.

“It's easy to forget because of the happy note he landed on, but Worthy's minus-9.6% catch rate above expectation was the worst number among all receivers during the 2024 regular season (per NFL Next Gen Stats). He was not making big grabs for much of the year, and he has to pick up where he left off in New Orleans.”

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