The Chiefs have one of the most potent weapons that the NFL ever has seen. And they have found a way to use quarterback Patrick Mahomes creatively.
The creativity comes not only from the coaching staff but also from Mahomes himself.
Mahomes recently explained to Liam McHugh the origin of Ferrari Right, a play that scored a red-zone touchdown against the Panthers. It began with a Philly Special-style setup, as Mahomes abandoned shotgun formation and walked to the right, feigning confusion. Mahomes then abruptly darted back, catching the snap as he was running to the left.
The defense reacted by flowing in that direction. Then, after a couple of steps, Mahomes stopped, spun, and sprinted to the right. Meanwhile, receiver Demarcus Robinson, who was split to the left of the formation, pretended to assume a blocking posture before darting away from the defensive back who was covering Robinson and breaking wide open while moving in the same left-to-right direction as Mahomes.
It started in complex fashion, but it ended with a pitch and catch.
"[T]here’s always been plays here and there that Coach Reid does a good job of letting me kind of help create and help design in a certain sense,” Mahomes said. “He has his white board, he just draws up plays all day and so every once in a while I’ll go in there and say, ‘Can we do this?’ And he usually gives me the green light. And so Ferrari Right kind of started as a joke, it started as I was taking snaps pre-practice and I would start running in jet motion and catching it. And all of a sudden I was like, ‘Man, I think this can really affect the defense. . . . Let me see if this is legal.’ And so took it to some coaches, then took it to Coach Reid and he helped design it and make something happen out of it, and it worked out and I was able to score a touchdown on it.”
Reid was far more receptive to Mahomes’ idea that Mahomes initially was to some of Reid’s ideas.
“My first and second year here, he would drop some plays and I would be like, ‘I mean, I’ll try it but but I don’t know how’s that gonna work with the defense and how they’re playing,’” Mahomes said. “It seems like every single time I had that thought, it was a wide open touchdown. So nowadays, whenever he draws up [a play], I’m just ready to go and ready to go out there and execute it.”
So could there be another Mahomes-designed play on Sunday night against the Raiders?
“I can’t tell you that,” Mahomes said, before offering up a hint. “I usually have a few plays here and there that I’ve designed, but it’s all about the confidence level Coach Reid has to call them.”
Tune in tonight to see if the Chiefs use and plays designed by Mahomes against the Raiders, and then we can all find out whether the play was called something like “Wheels On The Bus.”