+1
Well, today's the day. Pretty excited, this has the potential to be one of the closer/better matchups, on paper, in years. That said, even a lot of the "worse" on-paper matchups produced unbelievable games, so I'm not sure if that matters.
The Chiefs probably drew the worst possible opponent for them here, because their run defense is very bad and San Francisco's run offense is great, and has looked great recently. It's hard to imagine the 49ers not putting up a decent point total barring turnovers or crazy special teams or something, because they should be able to move the ball reasonably well most of the game. And that means limited KC possessions. One also wonders if Mahomes can fend off their pass rush, which is much better than the ones on the defenses he's faced the last two weeks (which he destroyed). He's mobile enough it might not make a huge difference, but that seems like the game. And it seems like he'll need a few of those Houdini game-changing plays to match San Fran, assuming they do score at a solid clip with that running game.
Would say it's particularly big whether the Niners jump out to a lead, then, because they're built to just grind you down if they do. And Jimmy G, though he hasn't been asked to do much, is totally capable of keeping them in more of a shootout anyway, if he has to.
Can't wait to see what happens. Chiefs are only 1.5 point favorites, and I'm awfully tempted to say the 49ers are gonna pull this one out, just because of that huge run offense/run defense mismatch. I think if the Chiefs win it's going to be on the back of big, unpredictable plays like huge ST efforts, turnovers, or just pure Mahomes magic even as they generate an effective pass rush on him, all of which are pretty hard to predict because they turn on just a few moments. Ditto for the handful of downfield shots Garoppolo might take. Those kinds of plays are all really marginal, but they seem like they'll be what the game turns on.