KC Chiefs JuJu Smith-Schuster's big play gets praise from Patrick Mahomes and Andy Reid

To say that the Kansas City Chiefs are shorthanded at wide receiver may be an understatement. With Rashee Rice and Marquise “Hollywood” Brown both sidelined for the foreseeable future – perhaps the entire 2024 season – the team only had five active wide receivers in its 26-13 victory over the New Orleans Saints. On Monday night, the team's most recently signed wide receiver led the team in receiving yards. Veteran pass catcher JuJu Smith-Schuster, now in his second stint with the Chiefs after returning to Kansas City on Aug. 26, had seven catches for 130 yards in prime time.

As Benjamin Solak from noted ESPNSmith-Schuster's 130 receiving yards are his most in a game since Jan. 10, 2021 – a 13-catch, 157-yard performance in a wild-card loss as a member of the Pittsburgh Steelers. That game lasted 1,366 days before the nearly 28-year-old Smith-Schuster managed 130 yards on Monday night.

After the game, both Smith-Schuster's quarterback and head coach praised the veteran's performance, even despite a goal-line deflection that resulted in an interception. Andy Reid acknowledged the error in the red zone and praised Smith-Schuster for his performance when his number was called again later in the game.

“JuJu is a good football player,” Reid said. “He has been a good football player for a long time. He had the ball in the end zone that was tipped and he felt terrible about it. Then he comes back with two big balls. He's a professional and does a great job.” That.”

The man on the other end of the connection, quarterback Patrick Mahomes, leaned on his trusted receiver Monday night and delivered eight scores for Smith-Schuster, second-most on the team behind Travis Kelce's 10. After the game, Mahomes explained why Smith-Schuster could immediately take off despite joining the team at the end of August.

“He has a good feel for the whole concept of the play,” Mahomes said. “So he knows how to get into the open spots, he has a good understanding of my timing, so some of those things, I can hit him early in some windows, maybe not necessarily learning, it's just learned through repetition. “I thought he did a good job today just finding the windows, beating the man when they were playing the man and finding the windows in the zone to make big catches.

Read more: Four takeaways from the Kansas City Chiefs' 26-13 win over the New Orleans Saints