Chiefs trimming down playbook, personnel packages for Week 17
The Kansas City Chiefs are making some changes to the offensive game plan ahead of their Week 17 tilt with the Cincinnati Bengals — and they're long overdue changes at that. According to NFL Media's Ian Rapoport and Tom Pelissero, the Chiefs are trimming down their playbook and personnel packages on the offensive side of the […]
The Kansas City Chiefs are making some changes to the offensive game plan ahead of their Week 17 tilt with the Cincinnati Bengals — and they're long overdue changes at that.
According to NFL Media's Ian Rapoport and Tom Pelissero, the Chiefs are trimming down their playbook and personnel packages on the offensive side of the ball. This change comes after losing four of their last six games, including an ugly Week 16 loss to the Las Vegas Raiders at home on Christmas Day.
Sources say the Chiefs whittled down their normal game plan from head coach Andy Reid's massive playbook for today's game against the Bengals, which means fewer plays, fewer personnel packages and, most likely, fewer players getting their hands on the football.
Kansas City has struggled with execution issues on offense throughout the 2023 NFL season. Those issues have ranged from receivers lining up improperly to penalties to players running the wrong routes.
The idea behind trimming things down is that you make players responsible for less and the level of execution on what they are responsible for will go up. You're not shuttling players on and off the field for specific personnel packages quite as much, but instead relying on being multiple out of a specific personnel package for a group of plays. Not as many players will get snaps and touches, which could also be beneficial.
There is also some risk involved with trimming the game plan down even more. The Chiefs were already running a basic version of their offense compared to years past because of the issues on the offensive side of the ball.
How much can you rightfully trim it down without giving your opponent an advantage? They might not learn the answer to that question this week as Lou Anarumo's defense with the Bengals is statistically in the bottom five of the NFL.
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