The Kansas City Chiefs and Buffalo Bills will face off on Sunday in an epic AFC Championship Game. One advantage the Bills have over the Chiefs is offensive efficiency. That’s why I think the Bills’ game plan will be to shorten the game and try to force the Chiefs to score on fewer drives.
What does that mean? On a play-by-play, drive-by-drive basis, the Bills gain more yards, score more, and turn the ball less than the Chiefs. When you give Kansas City fewer chances, Kansas City has to be more efficient than you are, and they haven’t been able to do that this year.
Bills gain more yards than Chiefs
Most people look at raw data to prove their point, so start there. This season, the Bills have gained 6,105 yards (10th in the NFL) and the Chiefs have gained 5,570 yards (16th). Moving to efficiency metrics, the Bills do even better. The Bills were sixth in yards per play with 6.0, while the Chiefs fell to 21st with 5.1.
Because of their tendency to create turnovers on defense, the Bills’ average drive starts at an NFL-leading 33.4, and they don’t need very long drives to get into scoring position. The Chiefs started with 30.1 yards on their own and needed to gain more yards to get into scoring position. Still, the Bills averaged over two yards more per drive than the Chiefs. Buffalo was eighth with a score of 35.4 and Kansas City was 13th with a score of 33.0.
Bills score more points than Chiefs
Returning to the raw cumulative stats, the Bills were second in the league this year with 525 points, while the Chiefs were middling at 15th with 385 points.
Using a per-drive metric, the Bills scored on nearly 50% of their drives, ranking third in the NFL, while the Chiefs were 10th at 43.2%. Buffalo also led in points per drive. Buffalo was second with a score of 2.92 and KC was 10th with a score of 2.27.
This season, the Chiefs’ offense hit a high with 30 points, a number the Bills surpassed 10 times. (Buffalo also scored 30 points three times.)
Time of possession shows both Chiefs and Bills want to keep the ball
The Chiefs led the league in time of possession per drive at 3:08 thanks to their excellent third-down conversion rate. Buffalo held the ball for 2:56 on each drive.
On average per game, the Bills were 8th in possession with 30:34 of possession per game, while the Chiefs were 10th with 30:31. It’s not that big of a difference.
Bills and Chiefs don’t give the ball back
A final note on efficiency is that neither team is going to beat themselves. Kansas City hasn’t turned the ball over in more than two months, or eight games, since the two teams played in mid-November. The Bills have committed just one turnover in that stretch — Josh Allen’s 50-yard pass to the goal line on third and 16 against the Patriots.
However, Kansas City started the year with a significant increase in turnovers, ranking ninth in the NFL with a turnover rate of 8.3%, while Buffalo was second at 4.6%.
This year’s playoff performance favors Buffalo’s scoring over Kansas City.
In the game against the Houston Texans, KC made field goals on their first two possessions before the punt. He then found the end zone on back-to-back drives (off knee downs). A punt, a field goal and a punter running out of the back of the end zone did the rest.
He scored 5 of 7 points (71.4%) on his scoring drives, but only found pay dirt on 2 of 7 (28.6%), resulting in just 23 points.
Against the Ravens, Buffalo had a touchdown, a punt, a touchdown, and a touchdown in the first half. The pace slowed in the second half, punts continued, and the game was decided by a long Tyler Bass field goal and a short Tyler Bass field goal.
On his scoring drives, he scored a touchdown on 5 of 8 drives (62.5%) and scored 27 points on 3 of 8 drives (37.5%).
Against the Broncos, the Bills forced just one punt on seven scoring drives and finished the game on a knee, scoring three touchdowns.
Buffalo’s postseason totals are 6-of-15 (40%) on touchdown drives and 11-of-15 (73.3%) on total scoring drives. Buffalo averaged 29 points against two defensemen who ranked in the top 10 in the league in scoring. All of these numbers are better than the Chiefs will face a Houston defense that ranks 14th in scoring.
