Chiefs vs. Bills Fantasy Football Worksheet, Championship Round

The Worksheet, a comprehensive fantasy football preview by Rich Hribar, breaks down everything you need to know about the Championship Round matchup between the Chiefs and Bills.

Find a breakdown of every Championship Round NFL game in our Worksheet Hub.

Buffalo	Rank	@	Kansas City	Rank
1.5		Spread	-1.5
23.25		Implied Total	24.75
30.7	2	Points/Gm	22.7	15
21.1	8	Points All./Gm	18.9	3
60.8	22	Plays/Gm	63.4	9
60.6	8	Opp. Plays/Gm	60.6	9
5.9	6	Off. Yards/Play	5.1	24
5.6	25	Def. Yards/Play	5.4	12
49.39%	4	Rush%	41.37%	23
50.61%	29	Pass%	58.63%	10
41.88%	11	Opp. Rush %	40.97%	8
58.12%	22	Opp. Pass %	59.03%	25

Against the Spread:

Chiefs: 7-10-1
Bills: 12-7
Chiefs Home: 3-6
Bills Away: 5-4
Chiefs as Favorite: 6-8-1
Bills as Underdog: 3-2

Game Overview

This is the playoff matchup we most anticipated seeing at some point in the postseason. It renews the best ongoing rivalry among front-end teams the league has to offer.

The recent history of this matchup has featured Buffalo finding a way to win these matchups in the regular season, but Kansas City is pulling out their playoff matchups.

The Bills have won four consecutive regular-season matchups between these teams, but the Chiefs have won all three playoff contests.

Buffalo defeated Kansas City 30-21 at home in Week 11.

That matchup was tight throughout.

Buffalo led 16-14 at the half, and the game was 23-21 until 2:27 left in the game when Josh Allen closed things out with a 26-yard touchdown run on 4th and 2.

That has been the story when Allen and Patrick Mahomes have squared off.

The past five times these teams have hooked up, the games have been decided by 9, 3, 3, 6, and 4 points.

All of those games were within four points heading into the fourth quarter.

Kansas City is playing in their seventh straight Conference Championship, an unprecedented run in the sport.

They are 9-0 at home this season.

The Chiefs won a league-high 11 games this year after trailing, winning 7 times after trailing in the second half, and 5 times after trailing in the fourth quarter.

Buffalo is 2nd in the NFL in points per drive (2.95), while the Chiefs are 10th (2.26).

Kansas City has converted 47.9% of their third downs (3rd), while Buffalo has converted 44.7% (7th).

If there are a few statistical edges on offense, they do favor Buffalo.

The Bills have converted 68.4% of their red zone trips for touchdowns (2nd), while Kansas City has converted 52.9% (24th).

Buffalo is the best team in the league at not beating themselves this season, which preserved last week’s narrow win.

The Bills have allowed a league-low 1.3 sacks plus turnovers per game.

They lead the NFL in turnover margin (+27), 10 more than the next highest team.

Buffalo has scored a league-high 138 points off takeaways while allowing a league-low 27 points off turnovers.

That was the difference in last week’s game against Baltimore.

When these teams played in Week 11, Buffalo won the turnover battle 2-1. On defense, they had 2 sacks without taking a sack themselves.

While Buffalo has a slight edge regarding offensive metrics, the Chiefs have been better defensively.

Kansas City is 10th in points allowed per drive (1.92), while Buffalo is 15th (2.05).

They are 12th in yards allowed per play (5.4), while Buffalo is 25th (5.6).

Quarterback

Josh Allen: Allen was kept in check last week through the air, throwing for a season-low 127 yards without a touchdown pass.

He did not throw a touchdown in either game against Baltimore this season, accounting for two of his three games without a touchdown pass.

Buffalo did not press the action in the passing game.

Allen only averaged 6.1 air yards per pass, his fewest in a game since Week 9.

He attempted 40.9% of his passes at or behind the line of scrimmage, his 2nd-highest rate of the season (his season average is 25.8%).

Only 18.2% of his passes went 10 or more yards downfield, well below his 33.7% rate on the season.

Baltimore went with a zone-heavy approach in the first matchup against Allen but was more balanced on Sunday.

We have noted Allen’s splits against man and zone coverage this season, something the Chiefs were cognizant of in their first matchup.

Kansas City played zone coverage on 72.5% of the passing snaps in the Week 11 matchup, their 5th-highest rate of the season and well above the 62.9% rate they have on the season.

They still found a way to pressure Allen on 42.2% of his dropbacks and blitzed 33.3% of the time.

When they did play man coverage in that game against Allen, he was 7-of-11 for 104 yards (9.5 Y/A) and a touchdown.

When they played coverage, Allen threw for 5.4 Y/A with an interception against zone coverages.

When they sent zone blitzes at Allen, he was 2-of-8 for 28 yards (3.5 Y/A) with an interception.

We have discussed these splits before, but Allen has thrown 21 touchdowns to 3 interceptions against man coverage (199 dropbacks), compared to 4 touchdowns and 3 interceptions against zone coverage (376 dropbacks).

Despite his lackluster yardage and failure to throw a touchdown on Sunday, Allen still found his way to a solid fantasy line (19.1 points) on the strength of two rushing touchdowns.

Allen has ramped up his rushing to close the season, which he has done well in this matchup.

Over his past nine games, Allen has averaged 8.1 runs per game and leads the league with an 8% scramble rate (he leads the league with a 10.2% scramble rate against man coverage over that span).

He has 11 touchdowns and 40 designed runs over that span.

Before that, Allen averaged 5.2 runs per game with 3 rushing touchdowns.

He had 19 designed runs over those opening nine games.

He has run a lot against the Chiefs.

He has rushed for 32 or more yards in all eight matchups with Steve Spagnuolo.

He has double-digit rushing attempts in each of the past six matchups.

That includes rushing 12 times for 55 yards and a touchdown in Week 11.

Patrick Mahomes: Mahomes also was not tasked to do much lifting through the air in the Divisional Round.

He connected on 16-of-25 passes (64%) for 177 yards (7.1 Y/A) with a touchdown.

He rushed 7 times for 14 yards (12.5 fantasy points).

That area of fantasy production is where we have been with Mahomes for most of the year. He has thrown more than one touchdown pass in two of his past six games.

He did not throw an interception.

Mahomes has only thrown two interceptions over his past 10 games, both of which came when these teams met in Week 11.

The Bills have done a good job of slowing Mahomes down in recent matchups.

In that Week 11 game, he averaged 5.9 yards per pass attempt with 196 yards through the air.

Buffalo will have to contend with the playoff version of Mahomes, who will be making his 20th career postseason start.

Buffalo has limited him to 196, 215, and 271 yards passing in the past three matchups between these teams.

Mahomes has thrown six touchdowns in those contests, including three in the Week 11 game.

When these teams met last postseason, Mahomes only had 215 yards passing but posted 9.4 Y/A while completing 73.9% of his passes.

The Bills have played a lot of two-high coverage against Mahomes in these matchups, something they did on 54.3% of his dropbacks in Week 11.

Against those looks (263 dropbacks), Mahomes is 32nd in rating this season (83.2), throwing for 6.4 Y/A with 5 touchdowns and 6 interceptions.

Against those coverages in Week 11, he was 13-of-18 for 100 yards (5.6 Y/A) with a touchdown and an interception.

When teams played a lot of Cover 1 and Cover 3 against Mahomes, he has been at his best this season.

Buffalo has a few question marks on the injury front, with cornerback Christian Benford and safety Taylor Rapp entering the week dealing with injuries.