Packers-Chiefs Q&A: Kansas City’s new defense under Steve Spagnuolo

On Sunday, the Green Bay Packers take on the Kansas City Chiefs in prime time. Pete Sweeney of Arrowhead Pride kindly volunteered to answer our questions about the Chiefs and provide some insight into their strengths and weaknesses.

APC: The Chiefs fired longtime defensive coordinator Bob Sutton this offseason and replaced him with Steve Spagnuolo. They also moved on from Justin Houston and Dee Ford while adding Frank Clark, Tyrann Mathieu, and other contributors. After all of those changes, has the defense improved?

Ah, the million dollar question.

Through the first six weeks, my answer was, “Yes, but only slightly.”

Then we saw the Chiefs’ best defensive performance of the season against the Denver Broncos. The Chiefs allowed season-low 6 points and 205 total yards while exploding for nine sacks.

But was that just an outlier performance against a poor offense? Unfortunately for Chiefs fans, I’m leaning yes. Take away that game, and the Chiefs are allowing 406 yards every time they take the field.

That will be helped by the return of Chris Jones, who has been absent since Week 6, but I’m not sure he returns this week.

We’d like to thank Pete. Be sure to check out the rest of our Q&A session with Arrowhead Pride over the course of the week as well as our Q&A session over there. As always, keep your internet machines tuned to Acme Packing Company this Sunday for our comprehensive game-day coverage of Packers versus Chiefs.