The NFL season could not have gotten off to a better start as we saw an AFC Championship rematch between the Baltimore Ravens and Kansas City Chiefs come down to the wire. Ultimately the deciding factor was one inch as Ravens TE Isiah Likely was barely out of bounds for a touchdown with time expiring. The final score does not indicate how much of this game was dictated by the Chiefs. After the Ravens opened up scoring with Derrick Henry’s first touchdown, the Chiefs responded quickly with a 5-play touchdown drive that ended with WR Xavier Worthy’s first professional touchdown.
After Worthy’s touchdown the Chiefs defense played great, and the Chiefs offense was moving the ball at will. Penalties, drops, and an interception forced the Chiefs out of good drives to open the game up to 3 scores on multiple occasions. Ravens QB Lamar Jackson tried his best to bring the Ravens back with his 395 total yards, but the Chiefs defense did just enough to hang on at the end of the game. Let’s take a look at some of the biggest winners and losers from last night’s game.
Winners
Ravens TE Isiah Likely
Likely was the star of last night’s game, rarely being covered by a Chiefs defender. Likely had 9 catches for 111 yards and 1 touchdown in what could be a breakout game for him. Being able to deploy multiple tight ends in this offense is going to be key for the Ravens down the line.
Chiefs WR Xavier Worthy
Not a bad start to an NFL career when you score 2 touchdowns on 3 touches. Worthy is going to be the explosive playmaker the Chiefs have been missing for 2 seasons now. He is going to have really big weeks and really quiet weeks as the 3rd or 4th receiving option in this offense.
Ravens DT Nnamdi Madubuike
Madubuike made the Chiefs one dimensional a majority of Thursday Night’s game. He was stuffing the Chiefs run game against the best interior line unit in the NFL. He also added 0.5 sacks last night as well. His 2023 breakout campaign is just the beginning for this guy.
Ravens RB Justice Hill
Hill got more snaps than many were expecting in Derrick Henry’s Ravens debut. Hill operated on 2nd and 3rd down a majority of snaps. Although he only had 1 carry; Hill had 6 catches for 52 yards. Could be an interesting PPR option in fantasy
Kansas City Chiefs Cornerbacks
With the loss of star CB L’Jarius Sneed the Chiefs had some question marks heading into the 2024 season. Last night the Chiefs corners held the Ravens receivers to 11 catches for 96 receiving yards on 41 pass attempts. That is lockdown stuff right there and that unit looks to be off to a good start to 2024.
Losers
Ravens TE Mark Andrews
Andrews had a rough night finishing with only 2 catches for 14 yards as other TE Isiah Likely had a monster game. He looked slow out of his routes last night and failed to get the first looks like he once did on pass plays. On the bright side for Andrews, he played more snaps and ran more routes than Likely so maybe he has a bounce back week next week.
Ravens RB Derrick Henry
Henry was swallowed up by the Chiefs defense all night as he finished with a poor 3.5 yards per carry. Another major concern is that Henry’s snaps were down last night. We rarely saw Henry on the field other than first down or a 3rd and short situation. He will be a touchdown dependent fantasy football option this season.
Kansas City Chiefs Red Zone Struggles
The Chiefs offense looked better than it did in 2023 last night but left a lot to be desired in the red zone. The same things that plagued them in that area happened again last night, penalties and drops. At some point they will fix it right?
Ravens QB Lamar Jackson
Jackson now falls to 1-4 against Patrick Mahomes in his career. Although Jackson put up big numbers last night, I think he would be the first to tell you last night was not his best showing. He missed a wide-open touchdown to Zay Flowers that would have tied the game. Lamar was not bad by any means, but his accuracy was poor last night and did not play well in the 2nd quarter.
Buffalo Bills
Buffalo why would you let Kansas City trade up to get Xavier Worthy?
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