Game Analysis

Kansas City (-4) vs CLEVELAND

• Patrick Mahomes was hit 12 times last week, which is tied for his second-most in a game in his career, and the hope for improvement at left tackle was crushed as DJ Humphries missed the last nine snaps against the Chargers with a hamstring injury.
• Mahomes had an average time to throw of 2.62 seconds last week, his fastest in a game since week 2, and he will need to continue getting the ball out quickly on Sunday with LT Wanya Morris back on the field. Morris ranks 5th-worst in pass-blocking efficiency and he will line up across from Browns edge defender Myles Garrett, who has 58 pressures (3rd).
• Mahomes does have a favorable matchup schematically against Cleveland’s defense with the 7th-highest Cover 1 rate and 3rd-highest Cover 3 rate. Kansas City’s offense is averaging 19% more yppp versus single-high safety coverages than two-high (3rd).
• Browns’ WR Jerry Jeudy is averaging 2.47 yards per route run since Jameis Winston took over as the starter in week 8 (7th) but he will be limited by CB Trent McDuffie, who is conceding 0.80 yards per cover snap (13th).
• Cleveland TE David Njoku is in jeopardy of sitting out the Chiefs game after suffering a hamstring injury against the Steelers. Njoku has 30 targets over his last two games and is worth 0.8 points to the Browns offense.
• Our model favors the Chiefs by 7.6 points, with a predicted total of 43.5 points, but Cleveland applies to a 72-27-4 ATS situation. I used Cleveland in my spread pool.