Why Do the Ravens and 49ers Keep Slapping Themselves?

Week 11 Walkthrough looks at two would-be bullies who aren't so tough when you stand up to them. Plus: the SNF showdown, Bills-Chiefs thrills, the Tebowization of Anthony Richardson and more.

There’s much to get to in this king-sized Week 11 edition of Walkthrough, including:

• Justin Herbert proves his doubter wrong. It’s me. I’m the (very lonely) doubter.

• Anthony Richardson has a Tebow-tastic afternoon against the Jets.

• The Ravens mix things up by self-destructing in the first half instead of waiting until the fourth quarter. 

• The 49ers Are Overrated, Episode V: Geno’s Revenge.

And much more.

But first …

The Joy of Bills-Chiefs

Watching the Buffalo Bills face the Kansas City Chiefs is not like watching a regular NFL game. It’s more like watching Asgardian Legendball. Or some arcade game after three cups of coffee and all of the leftover Halloween candy. Or attending your first concert, when you were a teenager and your folks let you go with your friends for the first time. Or some classy European erotica with tasteful cinematography, but at 1.25X speed, while blasting Megadeath. (Don’t judge.)

When the Chiefs and Bills square off, the highlights are higher, the passes appear to fly further, everyone runs a half-step faster and even the ordinary plays appear extraordinary. Even a so-so game provides thrill after exhilarating thrill.

The Bills handed the Chiefs their first loss of the season with a convincing 30-21 victory in Buffalo. Statistically and storyline-wise, the game was nothing special. The Bills outplayed the Chiefs for most of the afternoon, finally pulling away on a 23-yard Josh Allen run late in the fourth quarter. There was minimal drama, no down-to-the-wire finish, no “they left Patrick Mahomes 0.6 seconds and that was too much time” moment, no controversial penalty we’ll spend half the week talking about. It was a solid-but-unsurprising win by an excellent team.

But oh, the way the game felt. Every Amari Cooper reception seemed to be an over-the-shoulder Willie Mays basket catch.  Curtis Samuel appeared to be running on an air hockey table. Mahomes made his miscues look like highlights: Xavier Worthy could not tap both feet inbounds on one deep rocket, but the incomplete pass still looked like CGI. Defensive stops hit like the Hulk punching a tank. Even interceptions by Mahomes and Allen felt more like failed alley-oops in the NBA Finals than errant throws.

The Bills victory over the Chiefs meant everything and nothing. Both teams will reach the playoffs easily. The Chiefs’ undefeated status was more of a talking point than a team goal. The Chiefs proved to be flawed in the ways we knew they were flawed – Mahomes is trying to do far too much with a makeshift playmaker corps and some shaky offensive tackles – but they still kept things close against their toughest rival on the road. The Bills are top-to-bottom solid, but that is nothing new. When these teams meet again in the postseason, the only outcome of Sunday that will really matter is the increased probability that said meeting will occur in Buffalo, not Kansas City.

I don’t have much else to say about Bills-Chiefs. There is a lot to get to this week, including several games with much more serious playoff implications. But I could not brush off Bills-Chiefs as a “meaningless” game which everyone watched and therefore no one needs to talk about. It was another showdown of two of the best teams of the 2020s. It featured a signature performance by Allen. And it was an adrenalized blast. Let’s do it again in late January.

Not-So-Shocking-Anymore Upset Spotlight: Seattle Seahawks 20, San Francisco 49ers 17

What Happened

The 49ers did not play down to a lesser opponent. They played laterally to a fellow middleweight.