Jayden Daniels vs Caleb Williams
Jay Felicio
Teams don’t get to the Super Bowl without playing good football. But not all teams are perfect and there are often bumps along the way. With that, we’ll continue a DVOA tradition of looking at not when the Super Bowl participants played their best, but when they were at their worst.
Let’s look at the five worst games by DVOA chronologically of the San Francisco 49ers and Kansas City Chiefs, compare the struggles in those games, and how the Super Bowl opponent matches up with those potential weaknesses. For both teams, we’ll ignore Week 18 because of rested starters.
We’ll start with a look at the 49ers’ worst games by DVOA…
49ers Worst Games
Week 3: New York Giants 12 at San Francisco 49ers 30. There isn’t much interesting to say about this game, outside of the fact that the 49ers put up a 25.5% DVOA in this game and it still comes out as their fifth-worst game of the season. The Giants did not hit a game over 25% DVOA until Week 18. The Carolina Panthers and Washington Commanders did not do so at all in 2023. This was a short week on a Thursday night after the 49ers had played the Los Angeles Rams in Week 2. San Francisco did not have Brandon Aiyuk for this game due to a shoulder injury, but Brock Purdy still threw for 310 and two touchdowns, while Deebo Samuel had 129 receiving yards and a touchdown on 12 targets.
Week 6: San Francisco 49ers 17 at Cleveland Browns 19. This game against the Browns, who sported the best defense at the time (before getting passed by the Ravens at the end of the season … and we’ll get to them) was the first of a three-game skid for the 49ers. Purdy was constantly under pressure against the Browns and his way to escape was by fleeing the pocket. Purdy was sacked three times and completed just 44.4% of his passes. The 49ers went three-and-punt on 38.5% of their drives, opposed to their overall rate of 17.9% and averaged a season-low 3.9 yards per play. San Francisco’s defense hung on against Cleveland starter P.J. Walker outside of a 108-yard receiving day from Amari Cooper. Cleveland’s 19 points came on a second-quarter 16-yard Kareem Hunt rushing touchdown and four Dustin Hopkins field goals.
Week 7: San Francisco 49ers 17 at Minnesota Vikings 22. San Francisco’s opening drive ended with a Christian McCaffrey lost fumble that eventually led to a 20-yard Jordan Addison touchdown catch from Kirk Cousins. The Niners were behind the rest of the game and this was one of two games all season in which San Francisco did not run an offensive play with the lead. Purdy handled pressure better by design by getting the ball out quickly against Minnesota’s blitz-heavy game plan (without both Samuel and Trent Williams) but the Vikings created enough chaos to force two interceptions in the fourth quarter, both on Minnesota’s side of the field. Kirk Cousins threw for 378 yards and two touchdowns, both of those to Addison who had 123 yards in the game. It was the second-straight game the 49ers allowed an opposing WR1 to go off. San Francisco played with heavier personnel and boxes to slow down the run game, but that left the team exposed through the air. The 49ers allowed a season-high 6.8 yards per play.
Week 8: Cincinnati Bengals 31 at San Francisco 49ers 17. This was the third of three straight losses for the 49ers. Unlike the game against the Vikings, the 49ers put their efforts into stopping the pass and that didn’t matter much as they allowed their highest passing DVOA of the season at 49.8%. Joe Burrow threw for 283 yards and three touchdowns and Ja’Marr Chase had 100 receiving yards with a touchdown on 10 receptions. Chase’s production came on more manufactured touches like screens. Even his 17-yard touchdown came as he faked being a blocker for a screen on the outside and slipped behind the defense. Purdy again felt the pressure (without Williams and Samuel for the second straight game) despite the Bengals not blitzing often. This caused Purdy to flee the pocket and make mistakes. He threw an interception from the Cincinnati 8-yard line that was tipped and caught by Germaine Pratt and Purdy tried to make a throw on the run. Then in the fourth quarter, Purdy threw a bad interception targeting Aiyuk and threw the ball right into the hands of Logan Wilson. The score was 17-10 for both interceptions. Cincinnati scored on the first play after the second pick. While the 49ers scored again, the game essentially ended with a strip sack of Purdy on the following drive.
Week 16: Baltimore Ravens 33 at San Francisco 49ers 19. This was the highlight game everyone was waiting for during the regular season and it did not go the way the 49ers hoped. Just about everything that could go wrong did for San Francisco. Purdy threw four interceptions and while some of those were fluky, the Ravens were able to create the opportunities for those to happen. Purdy only completed 56% of his passes with his second-lowest aDOT of the season. Christian McCaffrey had over 100 rushing yards and both George Kittle and Brandon Aiyuk eclipsed 100 receiving yards but those raw numbers were mostly playing from behind and were not enough to overcome the turnovers. Defensively, the 49ers again put an emphasis on stopping the run and had a -43.5% run defense DVOA against the Ravens but Lamar Jackson threw for 252 yards and two touchdowns. Zay Flowers had 79 receiving yards and a touchdown on 13 targets.
When The 49ers Had The Ball
When things go wrong for the 49ers, they go really wrong. Brock Purdy can occasionally live dangerously on passing attempts and the key to San Francisco’s losses has been turning those risky throws into turnovers. Purdy had a 5.8% interception rate in the five worst games. Of course, it’s not as easy as you think to just say “intercept passes.” That will cause problems for most offenses. There also isn’t always an opportunity to do so. Purdy’s interception rate was just 0.7% in all other games during the regular season.
But one thing that has helped increase those opportunities is getting consistent pressure. Overall, Purdy was one of the better quarterbacks under pressure but when that came consistently, it sped up Purdy’s process and some of those negative plays happened. Four of those worst performances by DVOA were among Purdy’s five most pressured games.
There’s a bit of a chicken-and-the-egg here, but the 49ers were less explosive in these games. But it does show that if San Francisco gets knocked off schedule, some of the big plays can be contained. This isn’t just a leading/trailing metric. The 49ers’ explosive play rate drops when they’re trailing but it goes from a league-leading 24.6% to a league-leading 20.5%.
Purdy can be a quarterback that uses yards after the catch due to the ability of the pass catchers. Overall, he averaged an aDOT of 8.26 and 6.6 yards after the catch. In these games, Purdy’s aDOT was 7.45 with 7.2 yards after the catch. He doubled down on that on third down where his ALEX went from -1.0 overall to -2.2 in these games.
As a team, the 49ers also struggled in the red zone, converting just 50% of those trips into touchdowns, opposed to 72% in all other games.
When The Opponents Had The Ball
The 49ers were 11th in defensive DVOA against opposing No. 1 receivers but especially in the three-game skid, they gave up big games to the opponent’s top pass catchers: Amari Cooper, Jordan Addison, and Ja’Marr Chase. Those weren’t all against Charvarius Ward and that was sometimes by design, especially with Chase as the Bengals moved him around to hit different sides and depths of the field.
San Francisco also had struggles in these games against the pass when they went heavier to stop the run. This was the case against the Vikings and Ravens, who were able to throw against stacked boxes. The game against Minnesota was San Francisco’s highest rate of base defense this season.
During the regular season, the 49ers ranked 15th in DVOA against the run opposed to fourth against the pass, so it made some sense to put more effort there in some games. But that left the defensive backs on an island they weren’t always able to hold up on when teams decided to just throw the ball.
How The Chiefs Match Up
If there is a defense that can create enough chaos around the line of scrimmage to consistently get pressure and throw a quarterback off his rhythm, it might be these Chiefs. Kansas City was seventh in pressure rate during the regular season and this defense can create pressure out of a ton of different looks. Already in the playoffs, the Kansas City defense has gotten the best of Tua Tagovailoa and Lamar Jackson, while Josh Allen had to be perfect playing a ball control offense with short passes.
Even if the Chiefs get pressure, the question that could decide the game is if the defense can take advantage of any potential interceptions. Kansas City has converted on pressure with a league-leading sack rate (9.3%) but only 1.4% of opposing passes have been intercepted by the Chiefs, which was the fifth-lowest rate in the regular season.
Offensively, the Chiefs have Patrick Mahomes who causes a problem for everyone, but they also have the development of Rashee Rice as a WR1. Rice has done most of his damage as a short-area target working crossers and yards after the catch, but that could be an area that works against the 49ers — like the Chase game in Week 8.
Chiefs Worst Games
Week 4: Kansas City Chiefs 23 at New York Jets 20. This game feels like a lifetime ago. It was just the second game of the Taylor Swift era and the celebrity-filled suite, including Blake Lively, Ryan Reynolds, and Hugh Jackson, took center stage during the Sunday Night Football matchup. The Swift-Kelce relationship has aged well, but the gushing around Zach Wilson from this game did not. This was the Jets’ second-best passing DVOA game of the season (42.2%) while Wilson threw for 245 yards and two touchdowns. He completed 71% of his passes and completed some tight window throws but was mostly surpassing the expectations of “being Zach Wilson.” With the Jets down by three midway through the fourth quarter, Wilson fumbled a snap on a second-and-9 against a sim pressure that ended the comeback chances. The Chiefs started the game with three scoring drives in the first quarter but stalled with one field goal, a safety, two interceptions, and two punts over the next six drives. A field goal at the start of the fourth quarter gave Kansas City a three-point lead and then after the Wilson fumble, the Chiefs held the ball for the final 7:24 on a 15-play drive that included a 25-yard Mahomes scramble on third-and-23.
Week 8: Kansas City Chiefs 9 at Denver Broncos 24. These divisional rivals had played just two weeks earlier and the Chiefs escaped with a 19-8 win, though their 42.1% DVOA in that game was one of their five best of the season. The Week 8 loss against the Broncos, though, was the Chiefs’ worst game of the year. Offensively, Kansas City averaged a season-low 3.9 yards per play as the Broncos were able to pressure Mahomes without blitzing and forced him out of the pocket to extend plays. Mahomes took three sacks and his 7.3% sack rate was his fourth highest of the season. The Chiefs punted on their opening drive and punted just one more time for the remainder of the game. Usually that’s a good thing but five of their next nine drives ended in turnovers — two fumbles, two interceptions, and a failed fourth down. That also doesn’t count a muffed punt from Mecole Hardman on a fourth-and-17 that gave the Broncos the ball at the 10-yard line. Because of that, Denver’s average starting field position was their 42-yard line and Russell Wilson only had to throw 19 passes. The Broncos scored 17 points off turnovers while their average scoring drive off a turnover went just 14.7 yards.
Week 11: Philadelphia Eagles 21 at Kansas City Chiefs 17. Mahomes threw the ball 43 times in this game but totaled just 177 passing yards for a career-low 4.1 yards per attempt. While he only took one sack, Mahomes was under duress for much of the game and was hit a season-high 10 times. Mahomes had his second-highest aDOT of the season while he threw his lowest percentage of passes at or behind the line of scrimmage. Both teams struggled to move the ball and six of the Chiefs’ drives ended with a punt. Mahomes threw his lone interception into the end zone from the 14-yard line with the score tied 7-7 in the second quarter. The Chiefs held a 17-7 lead late into the third quarter but the Eagles were able to string together two second-half touchdowns. All three of Philadelphia’s touchdowns came on the ground with a 4-yard score from D’Andre Swift, a 10-yard draw from Jalen Hurts, and a Brotherly Shove from the 1-yard line that gave Philadelphia the 21-17 lead in the fourth quarter. Hurts was sacked five times and had an underthrown interception while just 35% of his completions picked up a first down. Both Chris Jones and Trent McDuffie had two sacks in the game.
Week 13: Kansas City Chiefs 19 at Green Bay Packers 27. This was the Jordan Love show. Love threw for 267 yards and three touchdowns. Those touchdown drives went for 75, 75, and 67 yards. The first two touchdowns game on the Packers’ first two drives and the Chiefs never had a lead in the game. The Chiefs had a chance to tie the game in the third quarter but a failed two-point conversion on an Isiah Pacheco run kept them down by two. The teams traded touchdowns but Kansas City followed that with a three-and-out and an interception while Green Bay kicked two field goals to extend the lead. Love was pressured often as the Chiefs blitzed on 41% of his dropbacks but he only took two sacks while he threw a third of his passes behind the line of scrimmage. When the Packers weren’t throwing screens to beat the blitz, Love was able to get the ball out into the voids in coverage. Green Bay was also relatively successful on the ground without Aaron Jones. AJ Dillon, who finished the season 40th in rushing DVOA among 49 running backs with at least 100 carries, had 73 yards on 18 carries.
Week 16: Las Vegas Raiders 20 at Kansas City Chiefs 14. While the 49ers’ Week 16 letdown wasn’t too surprising given the opponent, the Chiefs’ loss to the Raiders at home was a shock. This was Kansas City’s second-worst game of the season by DVOA (-36.4%), mostly due to self-inflicted wounds. The Chiefs took a 7-3 lead in the second quarter, but after forcing a Las Vegas punt, Kansas City ran a wildcat snap to Pacheco and there was a fumble at the mesh point between Pacheco and Mahomes. The fumble was picked up by Bilal Nichols for a touchdown. On the next offensive play, Mahomes lofted a pass to the outside that was intercepted and returned for a touchdown by Jack Jones. Aidan O’Connell completed just nine of his 21 attempts for 62 yards. Zamir White was the lone producer on the Raiders offense with 145 rushing yards on 22 carries.
When The Chiefs Had The Ball
The Chiefs’ worst games came when turnovers derailed the offense. Untimely fumbles or interceptions cost Kansas City the chance to make comebacks in most of these games. Mahomes had a 2.3% interception rate in the regular season, his highest as a starter. But that hasn’t been something close in impacting the Chiefs in the playoffs, where Mahomes has yet to throw an interception and has only had five passes defensed (Purdy has seven in one fewer game).
Stress on the passing game also spurned from the lack of options outside of Travis Kelce and Rashee Rice. In these games, Kelce and Rice accounted for 42.7% of the Chiefs’ targets. Justin Watson was the next most targeted Chiefs receiver and he barely averaged a yard per route run. The next four Chiefs all averaged under 1.0 yard per route run individually in these games.
That’s been the case for much of the season, but during the poor performances Kelce and Rice were not going off like they have been in the playoffs, which made the lack of complementary pieces more glaring.
Kansas City was also poor in the red zone during these five games. The Chiefs fell well below their usual red zone expectations and were just 17th in touchdown rate inside the red zone overall but in their worst games, they converted just 31.6% of the time, which puts them on par with the full-season Jets, easily the worst red zone offense in the league during the 2023 season.
When The Opponents Had The Ball
The Chiefs’ biggest defensive weakness this season came against the run and that turned up in a number of these matchups. Zamir White’s 145-yard day was a killer in Week 16 for a Raiders offense that could not move the ball through the air.
In these five games, Kansas City allowed opponents to run for 4.8 yards per carry and 3.2 yards after contact. This also comes with how light the Chiefs play with their defensive personnel. Kansas City had the fourth-highest rate of dime personnel on defense during the regular season and allowed 5.8 yards per rush with six or more defensive backs on the field.
There wasn’t much wrong in the passing game. The group of Wilson (Zach), Wilson (Russell), Hurts, Love, and O’Connell only completed 64.2% of their passes for 6.1 yards per attempt against the Chiefs. Kansas City had an 11% sack rate against these quarterbacks. Though if there was one missed opportunity, it was turnovers. Those quarterbacks combined for eight touchdowns and just one interception.
How The 49ers Match Up
Offensively, the 49ers aren’t afraid to run the ball. This would be especially true if San Francisco feels like Brock Purdy might not be able to handle the pressure of the Chiefs’ front and blitz looks. This could be the plan going in or an in-game adjustment. Christian McCaffrey led the league in rushing yards and was first in DYAR. The 49ers would have no problems letting McCaffrey run against a defense that ranked 27th in rushing DVOA. Purdy could have a Russell Wilson-esque 19 pass attempts.
Defensively, San Francisco was 11th in DVOA against opposing WR1s and fourth against tight ends. As we mentioned above, the play against WR1s was shaky during the 49ers’ three-game losing streak so how they play against Rice could be a tipping point given the attention sure to be around Kelce and the lack of options elsewhere.
The 49ers were one of the best teams in the league at creating interceptions and taking away the top two receiving options could force Mahomes into putting the ball into areas he would like to avoid. Even getting other Chiefs to handle the ball could be a win for the 49ers with turnovers like Mecole Hardman’s fumble out of the end zone against the Bills are more likely to happen when the ball is not in the hands of Rice or Kelce.
