Texas Tech football alumni: Mahomes’ 2018 debut has football world buzzing

The football world is buzzing after the 2018 debut of former Texas Tech football star Pat Mahomes who was sensational in leading the Kansas City Chargers to a win Sunday.

For the first time Sunday, Texas Tech football fans finally got to see an “Air Raid” era quarterback start a meaningful NFL game.  Pat Mahomes, passed for 256 yards, four touchdowns and no interceptions on 15-27 passing en route to a 38-28 road win over the Los Angeles Chargers Sunday afternoon.

Opinions about whether Mahomes would be a reliable starter in the NFL have been split since he was anointed to lead the Chiefs’ offense following last season.  But after the show he put on in week one, it seems everyone is now buying in.

NFL reporter and radio host Adam Schien had some of the most effusive praise of the former Red Raider when he referred to him as an NFL MVP candidate.

Meanwhile, Vinnie Iyer of The Sporting News proclaims that Mahomes is the best QB from the 2017 draft class.  Mahomes was taken at No. 10 overall in last year’s draft as one of three first-round QB’s (including No. 2 overall pick Mitch Trubisky and No. 12 overall pick DeShaun Watson).

"“There’s no doubt Mahomes has more raw passing talent than both Watson and Trubisky do. But under coach Andy Reid, Mahomes is working with a coach who can refine it, too,” he writes."

And though the Pat Mahomes’ era is only one game old, some are predicting that he will dominate the NFL for the foreseeable future.  Certainly, he is setup as well as any QB in the league thanks to the expertise of his head coach Andy Reid and his stockpile of weapons including wide receivers Tyreek Hill and Sammy Watson and Pro Bowl tight end Travis Kelce.

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"“The Chiefs don’t yet know exactly what they have in Mahomes, but they do know what they have with Reid, Hill, Hunt, star tight end Travis Kelce (who was hardly needed for Sunday’s offensive explosion) and even Spencer Ware, Conley and Watkins, and it’s extraordinary,” writes Brad Gagnon of Bleacher Report.“Those circumstances alone should enable the entire offense—and Mahomes and Hill in particular—to dominate for years to come."

While the praise from national scribes and football observers is nice, perhaps the greatest compliment Mahomes received following the win came from the opposing quarterback.  Chargers’ long-time QB and likely future Hall of Famer Philip Rivers was among the group impressed with what he saw from Mahomes.

"“I think he has a chance to be a really, really, really awesome player,” Rivers said.  “He has some arm talent where I’d like to borrow his arm every now and then on some of those throws. He can really throw it, and shoot, he was really accurate on some of those balls that just came out – he seems to be able to throw it from any arm angle. And he was poised. So he’s got a chance, and that‘s what I tried to tell him after the game, whether he wanted to hear it from me or not, that he’s got a chance to be really awesome.”"

Certainly, Mahomes has room to grow as he pointed out in his postgame comments.  He completed only 55.6% of his passes but was able to make up for that by ensuring that the passes he did complete went for huge yardage (he averaged 9.4 yards per attempt).

Plus, he benefited from extremely creative play-calling that incorporated elements of the “Air Raid” offense, especially in the red zone.  Two of of Mahomes touchdown passes came on jet sweep plays where he simply pitched the ball to the receiver in the backfield, something we saw quite often at Texas Tech.

As the season progresses, teams will build a scouting report on Mahomes and take away plays like that forcing him to adjust.  But given what he showed Sunday in his first meaningful NFL start, there appears to be nothing the former Red Raider can’t do.