Chiefs Showcase a *NEW* Power Rushing Attack in the Pre-Season Opener

Is 2024 the year the Chiefs' finally lean into more gap run concepts?

The Chiefs lost their first Pre-Season game against the Jacksonville Jaguars over the weekend but the game did it’s overall job. It gave us just enough to be frustrated about, enough to be excited about, and has every fan looking forward to the next game on the schedule. Pre-Season games from a fans perspective have a very minimal value but we love watching Carson Steel rip off a huge run or Jaden Hicks make a big hit in the flat.

It’s finding excitement - or frustration in the backup offensive linemen - that make these exhibition games interesting for fans of a team. For teams these games provide a much deeper insight into things they’ve been working on all Training Camp long. They’re honing in on specific skills for a certain player or working on fundamentals of plays that they plan on using throughout the season.

It’s that latter point that caught my attention the most from the Chiefs’ first game. It’s only pre-season and I have been burned by this in the past but watching the Chiefs and Jaguars I couldn’t help but notice something sticking out like a sore thumb. The Chiefs were running gap run schemes at an extremely high clip compared to their past. This doesn’t guarantee that they’re going to incorporate more of them in the regular season, but it certainly pours enough gasoline on that fire that we simply have to take a deeper look!

The Power Run Game

Since the Chiefs rebuilt this version of their offensive line in 2020, the call from fans has been to utilize a more downhill rushing attack. Leave the Outside Zone heavy approach in the past, utilize less Inside Zone RPOs, and lean on the big, strong offensive linemen they had accumulated. The call for gap - or “man” - blocking runs to be a more prominent part of the Chiefs offense had gotten louder and louder over the years.

Unfortunately, the Chiefs had never fully leaned into it. They have added runs like GT Counter, a traditional Power run, or even some Y Insert variations into the mix but they’ve remained the “curveball” runs of choice for the Chiefs’ offense. So why bark up this tree?

In the Chiefs first game of the 2024 season, 10 of their 19 running back runs were gap scheme runs. All 10 involved a pulling blocker and came out of a single back formation. Let’s go take a look at the different gap scheme runs the Chiefs got into vs the Jaguars.

Single/One Back Power

Single Back Power is a pretty self-explanatory run. It’s a Power run - pulling guard from the backside leading through the hole - with only one player aligned in the backfield. Traditional Power uses a fullback or H-back to kick-out an edge player but the single back version opts to spread the defense and account for the edge defender with an in-line blocker.

This is useful for the Chiefs because it allows the Chiefs to be more versatile in their formations. It also allows them to better marry their drop back passing game and run game together pre-snap. In this game, the Chiefs utilized two different variations of this Single Back Power.

11p, 2x2 formation