Patrick Mahomes TNF Spotlight: Player Props for Thursday Night Football Week 2

In case you forgot… Patrick Mahomes is very, very good.

It’s understandable that you’d forget, with all the hoopla around Josh Allen, Russell Wilson, or even Justin Herbert. Still, it’s somewhat unforgivable, and Patty gave us a not-so-subtle reminder of how great he is by dropping 360 yards and five TDs on the Cardinals last Sunday.

So here we are: We could not live with our failure (in ignoring the KC QB), and where did that bring us?

Back to looking at Patrick Mahomes props on a Thursday night.

His Kansas City Chiefs have a tougher defensive test in Week 2 against the Chargers, but I’m confident their new offensive look will again be successful — and I’ve got three free NFL picks to cash in on Mahomes dealing out death by a thousand methodical passes.

Patrick Mahomes TNF prop picks

• Over 25.5 completions
• Over 2.5 passing touchdowns
• Under 20.5 rushing yards

Click on each pick to jump to the full analysis.

Patrick Mahomes TNF props

Surgical precision

Any concerns that the absence of "Cheetah" would negatively affect Patrick Mahomes' performance were quickly put to bed, as the Kansas City megastar put on a clinic, going 30 of 39 for 360 yards with five touchdowns against the Arizona Cardinals.

Even scarier than Mahomes' numbers was how he went about eviscerating the Cards' defense: by being methodical with short-to-intermediate passes and distributing the targets all around.

• 2021: Mahomes targeted Hill and Travis Kelce 46.3% of the time, with just one other player (Mecole Hardman at 13%) above 10% in target share.
• 2020: Kelce and Hill got 45.5% of targets, with Hardman (at 10.1%) the only other pass catcher with a double-digit target share.
• Week 1 2022: Kelce and new WR JuJu Smith-Schuster accounted for 44.2% of looks from Mahomes, but three other players (Hardman, Marquez Valdes-Scantling, Jerick McKinnon) also had double-digit percentages for target shares and nine different receivers caught a pass overall.

Mahomes also racked up the gaudy numbers without any big downfield plays, as just three of his 39 pass attempts (and one of his 30 completions) were more than 20 yards downfield. Part of this was due to the Cardinals blitzing on 58.5% of Mahomes' dropbacks (an incredibly dumb move considering Mahomes is prodigal in dissecting opposing blitzes), forcing him into quick throws.

Even though the Chargers will present a very different defensive look for Mahomes, I'm expecting a similar passing breakdown as in Week 1.

Los Angeles only blitzed Raiders QB Derek Carr on 23.8% of his dropbacks last week, but was still able to ramp up the pressure using just its front four, led by Joey Bosa and Khalil Mack. In addition to the five sacks the Bolts recorded, Carr only managed four pass attempts of 20+ yards — going 1-for-4 with two interceptions.

Carr found the most success also sticking to the short/intermediate routes, primarily in the middle of the field (10/10, 104 yards), which is also where Mahomes also was most efficient at moving the ball (13/15, 176 yards).

The Chargers will again rely on the D-line to bring the heat, with more defenders dropping back and head coach Brandon's Staley scheme showing a lot of 2-high coverage, aiming to both force Mahomes into quicker throws while also taking away the deep bombs.

Carr was impatient and forced a few passes downfield, resulting in two of his three picks. Mahomes, however, showed he was more than content to slowly work down the field, taking advantage of whatever WR (or RB) mismatch he has had to continuously move the chains. Lots of short/intermediate completions will add up over the game, which makes me love the Over 25.5 completions on Thursday night.

Oh, and for good measure: Mahomes has topped this number in six straight games dating back to last season.

Prop: Patrick Mahomes Over 25.5 completions

Seeing red (in the zone)

Mahomes loves playing in September, when many opposing defenses are presumable still working out kinks and are ripe for the picking, as he has his highest career completion percentage (68.9%) and yards per attempt (8.85) in the opening month — with a ridiculous 46 passing touchdowns against just three interceptions in 14 September games.

He certainly bolstered those numbers with last week's performance, and I like his chances of going Over his 2.5 pass TD line on Thursday as well against a Chargers defense he's used to racking up touchdowns on.

Mahomes threw for 410 yards with three scores in his last meeting against the Bolts (Week 15 last year) and totaled 670 yards and six TDs in both 2021 matchups.

Yes, the Bolts have some new faces on defense from last season. However, they are still operating the same defensive scheme as last season, which Mahomes had no trouble scoring on, and we saw last week that L.A. still has some things to tighten up in pass coverage.

The Chargers had just one cornerback — nickelback Bryce Callahan — post a PFF coverage grade within the Top 88 CBs for Week 1, while Derek Carr threw for 295 yards and two touchdowns despite getting sacked five times and getting picked thrice — and the Chiefs' signal-caller is unlikely to give the ball away so frequently.

Finally, what makes Mahomes Over passing TDs always an enticing play is the Chiefs’ approach to scoring in the red zone.

Last year, 55.1% (109/189) of Kansas City's red-zone plays were passes. Inside the 10, Mahomes had an NFL-best 34 completions on 50 pass attempts, against just 22 running plays —  an almost 70% preference to keep the ball in the former MVP's hands.

The Chiefs went even more extreme in Week 1 of 2022, opting to pass on 13 of 16 red-zone plays and seven of eight plays inside the 10.

When Kansas City gets into the scoring zone, they have a propensity to trust Mahomes over the ground game. With the offense more diverse and giving Mahomes even more weapons than before, it seems like Reid will keep the ball in the QB's hands even more.

And with a Chargers defense that had some coverage issues against a lesser passing attack... I like Mahomes to again log at least three passing touchdowns.

Prop: Patrick Mahomes Over 2.5 passing touchdowns

No, I don't think I will (run)

As mentioned above, Mahomes is dealing with a sore wrist, but it didn’t stop him from lighting up the Cardinals’ secondary.

What he didn’t do, however, was tuck it and run, as he had just two rushes after injuring his wrist and three carries overall. This was even when getting blitzed nearly 60% of the time, he still opted to continuously find an open target, as opposed to scrambling for a couple of yards.

I mean, who could blame him? Taking extra hits (especially with a sore wrist) is something nobody enjoys, and was wholly unnecessary when he had open receivers all the time.

Last season, Mahomes set a career-high with 5.8 yards per carry on nearly 4 rushes per game. However, his deference to running against a blitz-heavy defense in Week 1 doesn’t portend to a very scrambly performance against a team that will blitz significantly less.

The Chargers will be bringing pressure mainly with their front four, meaning there will be more defenders back in coverage — so, if Mahomes does have to leave the pocket, more bodies will be ready to cut him off.

I’m still expecting him to opt for short passes over short runs again on Thursday, especially with protecting his wrist a major consideration, which has me leaning towards the Under on his rushing total.

Prop: Patrick Mahomes Under 20.5 rushing yards

Pages related to this topic