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The Jacksonville Jaguars looked hapless against the Kansas City Chiefs on Sunday, falling 28-2, scoring their only two points on a punt block early in the game. Outside of that play however, the vast majority of the team was terrible, and that's being kind.
I'll start with the "good" stuff, as I don't really think the defense played all that poorly. They limited the Chiefs to under 300 total yards and quarterback Alex Smith looked mediocre at best against a team with minimal pass rush. The Chiefs offense only scored 21 points, most of which came from getting great field position after poor special teams play or turnovers.
In fact, the Chiefs longest drive of the day was 57 yards for a touchdown. The Chiefs offense as a whole only had three drives over 30 yards, with just a single drive over 35 yards.
Their three scoring drives? They were 24 yards, 21 yards, and 57 yards.
With just four hits on the quarterback and a sack (which was more Smith running to a sack), the Jaguars were able to limit Smith to just short passing and check downs much of the day. The Chiefs running game was also bottled up, for the most part, allowing just 120 rushing yards with the longest run being 18 yards.
So, the good was that the defense did more than enough, all things considered, to give the Jaguars a chance to win the game.
The problem however was the fact that the other areas of the team were so awful, they didn't stand a chance to win.
The offense overall was dreadful. Blaine Gabbert couldn't get into rhythm at all, looked panicked on quite a few of his throws and looked thoroughly confused by the multiple fronts the Chiefs used all day. To couple with that, the few times Gabbert did make nice throws there were some drops and bad penalties negating what would have been first downs.
Not only did Gabbert not look good overall, not only did the receiving options not help out when given the chance, but the interior of the offensive line was a travesty. Both Luke Joeckel and Eugene Monroe got beat at times, which is to be expected with a pass rushing duo like the one the Chiefs have, but the interior of the line was a massive issue all day long, not just in pass protection but also in run blocking.
Then to tie it all up nicely in a bow, Jaguars punter Bryan Anger also had an awful day punting the ball despite setting team "records". Anger punted 11 times, which was a franchise record, for an average of 50.8 yards per punt. Overall however, Anger's punts were often poor or short, giving the Chiefs plenty of room for returns and setting up good field position.
Dexter McCluster finished with a double-digit punt return average, including a 36-yard return on a poor punt.
Also, just a quick note about something that really bothered me at the game: Someone had a three or four month old baby with them at the game. I wouldn't have taken my two-year old daughter to that game in that heat. What the hell, man?