Andy Reid shut that talk down in a hurry Sunday. He was responding to the obvious question, after another flat-lining by the Chiefs' offense, the team's fifth loss in six games after a 5-0 start, a game that gave them one touchdown and a combined 19 points in two games.
Whether he was saying it just to keep the dogs at bay after a 16-10 loss to the Bills before a booing home crowd, or just because he didn't want to show his hand yet, Reid gave the obvious question a firm "No."
#Chiefs coach Andy Reid tells reporters he didn’t consider replacing Alex Smith at QB and isn’t thinking about going to Patrick Mahomes next game: "That's not where I am at right now.”
— Ian Rapoport (@RapSheet) November 26, 2017
That’s first-round pick Patrick Mahomes, the heir apparent whose ascent everyone was sure had been delayed for the entire season when Alex Smith launched the Chiefs into the role of early Super Bowl favorites, and himself into the MVP conversation.
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That conversation has gone silent, and that favorite status is long gone. The question of whether Smith has abdicated his throne remains. Reid is the only one who can make that call.
It’s still too early.
Let’s not pretend, however, that Reid would not pull the trigger on a change because Smith is his hand-picked, chosen-one, on-field alter ego, or because Mahomes is too young and Smith is too much of a veteran with too much of a history with Reid.
Ask Donovan McNabb about that.
In their 10th season together in Philadelphia, in 2008, after a Super Bowl trip and three other NFC title games, Reid yanked McNabb at halftime of a late November game in Baltimore in favor of, yes, an heir apparent, Kevin Kolb. The change only lasted that half (the Eagles got blown out in the game, and Kolb threw a 107-yard pick-six to Ed Reed), and McNabb and the Eagles went on to another NFC championship game, losing to the Cardinals.
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Reid didn’t make the full-time move until two seasons later, when he traded McNabb to Washington and went with Kolb (who got injured almost immediately and ushered in Michael Vick’s return). It took that much for Reid to make the switch. But he did it.
He doesn’t have nearly that long a history with Smith in Kansas City, and he has shown no signs of having soured on Mahomes as the quarterback of the future.
The entire season, starting on draft day in April, has unfolded around the theme of Smith looking over his shoulder. So even he knows the score. Plus, as everyone knows well, he has been in this spot before, with the 49ers in 2012, with the Mahomes role played by a youngster named Colin Kaepernick.
If the NFL has taught us anything this season, however, it’s that quarterback changes are not a magic wand for sputtering teams. And this is when the demoted starters have not been within a game of a Super Bowl, as Smith has been.
Reid could have just looked across the Arrowhead Stadium field for proof that there’s no instant fix, certainly not from rookies who aren’t ready. The Chiefs may be broken, but the specter of Nathan Peterman The Sequel won't fix them.
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Which is harsh to say about Mahomes. But Reid deserves the benefit of the doubt about whether his quarterback is ready to play under playoff-contending conditions — at least more benefit than Buffalo coach Sean McDermott deserved.
Reid needs to fix his offense, that's for sure. The Chiefs are very lucky the AFC West has played out the way it has — the rotten start by the Chargers, the rotten ongoing stretches by the Raiders and Broncos — or else they wouldn’t still be in control of the division.
The Chiefs are still in front. Smith is still looking over his shoulder. Reid shouldn't panic yet, not with five weeks left.
But Reid has had his hand on the trap door before, and he's not afraid to throw it open.
