{"id":646584,"date":"2026-01-01T22:35:24","date_gmt":"2026-01-01T22:35:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/646584\/"},"modified":"2026-01-01T22:35:24","modified_gmt":"2026-01-01T22:35:24","slug":"all-3-chiefs-coordinators-reflect-on-disappointing-2025-season","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/646584\/","title":{"rendered":"All 3 Chiefs\u2019 coordinators reflect on disappointing 2025 season"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ahead of the Kansas City Chiefs<\/a>\u2019 season finale against the Las Vegas Raiders<\/a> in Week 18, the team\u2019s three coordinators took questions from the press for the final time during the 2025 season.<\/p>\n

Defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo assured his listeners that even though neither team has a playoff stake in this game, there will be plenty at stake in Las Vegas.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re fighting for some things in this last game that we want to hang our hat on,\u201d he explained. \u201cI\u2019m not a big stat guy \u2014 I don\u2019t go into them \u2014 but I hear the guys talking about it, so there\u2019s a lot of pride there in this last game.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Chiefs are one of only six NFL teams that have allowed less than 20 points per game this season<\/a>. If that holds, it would be the third consecutive season Kansas City has hit that benchmark \u2014 after a stretch of three years allowing 22 points per game.<\/p>\n

With only a 6-10 record to show for it, a celebration may not be warranted. Still, Spagnuolo\u2019s unit was a key reason many of the Chiefs\u2019 battles remained close.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Mark Konezny-Imagn Images<\/p>\n

\u201cThere were some really good stretches of defense,\u201d he noted. \u201cI go back to the Indianapolis Colts<\/a> game where we had those five or six straight three-and-outs. There were some games in there where we played winning football and helped our team get in a position to win.\u201d<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, Kansas City had a 1-8 record in one-score games.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat was disappointing \u2014 I haven\u2019t gone back and reflected on all of it \u2014 was some end-of-game defense that I would have liked to have back,\u201d said Spagnuolo. \u201cIf we could have found a way to make one play towards the end of the game, it either would have given our offense the ball back or we would have found a way to win the game. That more than anything sticks out. If we can get better at that, I\u2019ll be happy.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Chiefs\u2019 special teams coordinator Dave Toub shared that sentiment from a different perspective.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe just didn\u2019t make plays,\u201d he told reporters. \u201cWe just couldn\u2019t get a game where we made plays to win the game \u2014 and I\u2019m just speaking on my end of it. In the past, we\u2019ve done that a lot of times. The way we started out in Brazil \u2014 with the fast field goal that we did? That was awesome. That was cutting-edge\u2026 then [Harrison] Butker ends up missing five kicks in September. That was like a Debbie Downer right there.\u201d<\/p>\n

Among the nine kicks Butker has missed in the 2025 season, five occurred in September<\/a>. That set up the veteran kicker for criticism throughout the year.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt says something that he got off to a bad start,\u201d said Toub, \u201c[and] then it was always there: the doubt, \u2018Is he going to make it or is he not?\u2019 Then he had a good string in October and November [before] it popped up again in December. That\u2019s kind of how the year went for us.\u201d<\/p>\n

But there were some bright spots in Toub\u2019s evaluation of the season.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think now we finally cracked the top-10 as far as our kickoff goes,\u201d he said. \u201cWe had a lot of young players \u2014 and they just keep getting better and better \u2014 so I\u2019m happy with that. Kickoff return\u2026 not where I wanted it to be at this point. We\u2019re probably in the middle of the pack, towards the 20s there, and that\u2019s just not good enough; we have to do a better job getting some bigger returns in kick return.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Icon Sportswire via Getty Images<\/p>\n

In Week 17, rookie running back Brashard Smith fielded the first two punt returns of his career. He navigated traffic to gain 44 yards on the second, garnering excitement from Toub. Smith could be the solution to a more significant return game.<\/p>\n

On the flip side, Kansas City\u2019s kickoff and punt coverage teams have a notable streak through 16 games that everybody would like to keep.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe didn\u2019t give up anything big,\u201d explained Toub. \u201cWe still have another game left, but we didn\u2019t give up a touchdown to this point, which is always good. We didn\u2019t give up any huge returns, but we weren\u2019t killing it in the return game on either of them. We just have to keep getting better. I\u2019m excited about our young players. I think going forward, we\u2019re going to take another step for sure.\u201d<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, offensive coordinator Matt Nagy shared a positive reflection on the season.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere were parts in the middle of the season where we felt like we were at a peak level offensively,\u201d Nagy noted. \u201cUnfortunately, it didn\u2019t last the whole way through the year \u2014 and now here we are playing in this game that is important for us to finish strong. It\u2019s our job to do that: to coach strong, [for] the players to play strong \u2014 and in the end, win. The last several games didn\u2019t go how we wanted, but we want to finish on a high note.\u201c<\/p>\n

The Chiefs have lost five straight games to this point, an unacceptable finish to the year by anyone\u2019s standards at 1 Arrowhead Drive. From here, it will be about what actions the organization can take to ensure these mistakes aren\u2019t repeated in 2026.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ahead of the Kansas City Chiefs\u2019 season finale against the Las Vegas Raiders in Week 18, the team\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":646585,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2063],"tags":[346,7,118,110,922,1193,2438,2437,6],"class_list":{"0":"post-646584","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-kansas-city-chiefs","8":"tag-chiefs","9":"tag-football","10":"tag-kansas-city","11":"tag-kansas-city-chiefs","12":"tag-kansas-city-chiefs-news","13":"tag-kansas-city-chiefs-roster","14":"tag-kansascity","15":"tag-kansascitychiefs","16":"tag-nfl"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/115822233550672776","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/646584","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=646584"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/646584\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/646585"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=646584"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=646584"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=646584"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}