Kenneth Walker & Chiefs head to Seattle

Kenneth Walker is going back to Seattle, and if I'm the Chiefs, I'm giving him every opportunity to make his old team regret letting him leave. It's the Chiefs and Seahawks on Sunday Night Football. I'm Pete Sweeney for the Kansas City Star with three points to watch, and Ken Walker is my first point. Now, the Seattle Seahawks' run defense is good. They're allowing just three and a half yards per carry. That's actually tied with the Chiefs, but this is the Super Bowl MVP returning home. Walker this week has tried to downplay some of that emotion, but if I'm the Chiefs, I'm letting him use it. Point number two, let anyone but receiver Jackson Smith and Jigba beat you. JSN leads the NFL with 717 receiving yards. For perspective, the Chiefs leader, Travis Kelsey, has 299. That's a 418-yard difference. He's elite, really elite. Everything that comes back about him as a person, high character, and you have that kind of talent and that kind of high character, that's a pretty good thing to have. Then you're on the other side of it. It's a pretty tough thing to defend against, so we got a lot of respect for him. I'd give JSN extra attention, mixed coverages, muck it up for him as much as possible. Do anything you can to make sure that he doesn't control this game. Point number three, you got to get to Sam Darnold. When Darnold has a clean pocket, he completes 75.3% of his passes. Under pressure, just 38.3%. That's a 37 percentage point drop. The Chiefs finally ended their sack drought last week by getting to the quarterback four times, and they'll want to keep that going this week. We did a little bit better job of that this past week, and hopefully that continues because, you know, when the quarterback, it's a little bit demoralizing when, you know, you do really good on the coverage end and they do really good rushing the passer, and yet he finds his way out of there and they complete it. But it was good to get a few of those last week. So my prediction for this game, Chiefs 26, Seahawks 20. I understand that this is one of the better defenses, if not the best defense the Chiefs have faced. I understand an injury to Rasheed Rice, offensive line injuries for the Chiefs. Josh Izudu is expected to start at right tackle. But in the end, this is still Mahomes playing at an MVP level versus Sam Darnold, and I am not picking against Patrick Mahomes. For the Kansas City Star, I'm Pete Sweeney.