Alex Smith's Limitations Spell Big Trouble for Chiefs in AFC West

The AFC West has become the NFL's best division in 2016. Three of the division's four teams sit at 7-3 or better.

One team, the division-leading Oakland Raiders, features one of the league's best offenses and an MVP candidate in quarterback Derek Carr.

Another team, the Denver Broncos, is the defending world champion. They possess arguably the NFL's best defense and a Defensive Player of the Year contender in outside linebacker Von Miller.

Then there are the Kansas City Chiefs, a team that does many things well but nothing great. They don't have Oakland's high-powered offense. They don't have Denver's punishing defense.

And if quarterback Alex Smith doesn't ratchet up his game in a hurry ahead of Sunday's showdown with the Broncos in Denver, the Chiefs aren't going to have much of a shot at winning the division or making noise in the AFC playoffs.

At first glance, Smith's numbers last week against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers don't look bad. He completed 77.4 percent of his passes. His yardage total on the afternoon was his third-highest of the season. His passer rating checked in at 99.0.

Peter Aiken/Getty Images

However, upon further examination, any shine from Smith's afternoon quickly wears off.

Yes, he posted his third-best game of the season by yards—at all of 261. It was also just the third time he's topped 250 passing yards in a game. For the sixth time in nine games, Smith threw fewer than two touchdown passes.

Most importantly, the Chiefs lost to the Buccaneers—at Arrowhead, no less.

Some will point out it's not solely Smith's fault the Chiefs lost to Tampa. Further, the Chiefs are 7-3 and still in the hunt in the division. While Smith's numbers are down in some categories, they are up in others.

Year	Comp. %	YPA	PYPG	TD	INT	Rating	QBR
2015	65.3	7.4	217.9	20	7	95.4	66.5
2016	67.2	6.9	230.8	9	4	91.2	50.7

Those are valid points, and head coach Andy Reid didn't sound concerned about his quarterback while speaking with Adam Teicher of ESPN.com:

"

I think Alex is OK. He's going to be fine. We've just got to keep going here. He does a great job with leadership and all of those things. He'll be fine. We've had a couple of weeks here when we've been in a little bit of a slump and we've got to pull out of it and get better. That's all of us.

"

If Reid wants more than the participation trophy the Chiefs got for last year's short postseason visit, he'd better get concerned. 2016 is shaping up as a sequel to 2015—one of those sequels that isn't as good as the original.

Category	2015	2016
Total Offense	331.2	333.8
Rushing Offense	127.8	97.9
Passing Offense	203.4	235.9
Scoring Offense	25.3	22.2

From a yardage standpoint, the offense is in a similar spot compared to last season. The passing offense is up slightly, but only because a Chiefs run game that ranked sixth last year has fallen from the top 20 without Jamaal Charles.

That lack of a run game has put more pressure on Smith, and the results have not been encouraging.

Per Teicher, the Chiefs have scored two or fewer touchdowns in six of the eight full games Smith has played this season. He ranks 26th among quarterbacks in passer rating on third down. The Chiefs are next-to-last in red-zone touchdown percentage, and their scoring is down over a field goal per game.

These numbers don't give one the warm and fuzzies, especially when you look at the Chiefs' schedule the rest of the way:

Week	Opponent	Record
12	at Denver Broncos	7-3
13	at Atlanta Falcons	6-4
14	Oakland Raiders	8-2
15	Tennessee Titans	5-6
16	Denver Broncos	7-3
17	at San Diego Chargers	4-6

Based on opponents' record, only the Carolina Panthers have a more difficult schedule looking forward. The Chiefs' Week 12 trip to Denver kicks off a murderous three-week stretch that will also see them head to Atlanta and host the surging Raiders.

Smith told Teicher: "I think those things only become more magnified, I guess. I think they become more important as the games get bigger and bigger. No question. Yeah, they're huge. That's something that we do put a lot of focus on [and] we work hard at."

The thing is, we've seen nothing to indicate some big turnaround is coming.

What we have seen is every criticism of Smith borne out—that he's a good quarterback, but not a great one; that he's been propped up in Kansas City by a strong run game and punishing defense; that he isn't good enough to carry an offense.

In 2016, with that ground game not as strong and the defense not as stifling, Smith's limitations are becoming more evident.

This may all seem critical of a team that's 7-3, a group that won 11 games last year, including 10 straight after a 1-5 start. With a win in Denver on Sunday, the Chiefs will be in the driver's seat for a wild-card spot in the AFC and remain nipping at the Raiders' heels in the West.

But that sequel sounds a lot like last year's story: a second-place Chiefs team that was good enough to make the postseason tournament but not good enough to do much once they got there.

In that respect, maybe the team is reflected in its quarterback. Maybe these are Alex Smith's Chiefs.

A good team.

But not a great one.

Gary Davenport is an NFL analyst at Bleacher Report and a member of the Fantasy Sports Writers Association and Pro Football Writers of America. You can follow Gary on Twitter: @IDPSharks.