Chris Jones Named AFC Player Of The Week After Dominating Jets

The Kansas City Chiefs needed a big game from defensive tackle Chris Jones, and he gave it to them against the New York Jets and earned the AFC Player of the Week award as a result. 

The Chiefs have been waiting for Jones to come through and have this game for quite a while now. He went into the Jets game with just one half-sack, and Jones was shut out on the stat sheet in the two games against the Seattle Seahawks and Denver Broncos before that. 

It took some time for Jones to come through in this game, but it was worth the wait. The Chiefs went into halftime with a narrow 14-12 lead, but they discovered their lost pass rush early in the third quarter when defensive end George Karlaftis got Kansas City’s first sack of the day. 

That opened the floodgates for Jones and the rest of the defense, and he was up to the task and then some. Jones had a pair of sacks, and according to Matt McMullen of Chiefs com he filled up the stat sheet, posting he tallied five pressures, two sacks and a batted pass. 

It waas Jones' fourth-career "Player of the Week" award, and his first since 2024.

In a separate piece by The Athletic, Jones also revealed that his first sack was the result of a deliberate error. He was supposed to line up just inside linebacker Drue Tranquill, but the two players switched positions, and that created the mismatch that allowed Jones to get to Jets quarterback Geno Smith and bring him to the ground. 

The sacks also turned the tide in the close game. The Chiefs went on to score three straight touchdones while shutting the Jets down, and the result was a 35-12 Kansas City win. 

The Chiefs have been struggling to get their pass rush going, but they’re a different team when Jones plays at this level. He’s normally double-teamed constantly, but moves like the switch with Tranquill aren’t exactly unprecedented, as the Chiefs occasionally move him around the defensive formation to give Jones opportunities to get to the quarterback. 

The Chiefs will travel to play the Atlanta Falcons this week, and they’ll be looking for more of the same from Jones. Kansas City is currently 6-2, and they have a chance to pull even with the Denver Broncos in the AFC West in what’s expected to be a great two-team race in the second half.