When the NFL revealed its 2025 schedule in May, one of the more exciting matchups on the calendar was the Kansas City Chiefs and Washington Commanders. The Chiefs have been the class of the NFL over the last five years, while the Commanders were the league’s best story in 2024.

The real reason for the excitement surrounding this matchup was the quarterbacks: Patrick Mahomes and Jayden Daniels. Mahomes is the NFL’s top quarterback and already a future Hall of Famer. Meanwhile, Daniels was the NFL’s fastest-rising star after leading Washington to its best season in 33 years.

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The two teams play on Monday night at Arrowhead Stadium. Neither team is where they expected to be through seven weeks. Kansas City is 4-3, but has won two in a row and four of its last five games. Unfortunately for the Commanders, injuries have wrecked the first half of their season, and they sit at 3-4 heading into Monday night.

One of those injuries is to Daniels, who will miss Monday’s game at Kansas City. Daniels injured his hamstring in last week’s loss at Dallas and was ruled out for next week. That means we will not see the first-ever matchup between Mahomes and Daniels. Mahomes is disappointed that Daniels will not share the field with him in Week 8.

“Yeah, I mean, you want to go up against the best of the best, and Jayden with the way that he played last year, man, he’s in that category,” Mahomes said Thursday. “He’s a talented football player (that) I’ve watched play since he was at Arizona State, to LSU, and to now in the NFL. (Commanders OC) Kliff (Kingsbury) speaks very highly of him as a person. I hope he gets healthy sooner rather than later, but at the same time, I know Marcus (Mariota) can play, too. I’ve seen it firsthand at Arrowhead in the playoffs. I’ve seen him play throughout my entire career and have a lot of successful games, including this year. We understand it’s still going to be a great challenge going up against a great football team and a guy that has had a lot of success in the NFL.”

Mahomes said all the right things, showing respect to Mariota, who knocked the Chiefs out of the playoffs in January 2018. But the competitor in him would love to be competing against Daniels, who many labeled as the NFL’s next big thing after a historic season.

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Without Daniels, Kansas City is a massive 12.5-point favorite on Monday night, via BetMGM.

This article originally appeared on Commanders Wire: Washington Commanders: Patrick Mahomes hoped to face Jayden Daniels