The following is an excerpt from Warren Sharp's 2026 Football Preview. In addition to Warren's deep, detailed write-up on all 32 NFL teams, each chapter features page after page of full-color charts, stats, and heatmaps, as well as penalty analysis from Joe Gibbs. Click here for a full FREE chapter from the 2026 Football Preview.
Penalties are an under-discussed aspect of NFL success and failure. Average teams can become playoff contenders with good discipline, and good teams can become great simply by winning the penalty battle.
Let's look at how the Kansas City Chiefs performed from a penalty perspective in 2025 and where they can improve in 2026.
Kansas City Chiefs 2026 Penalty Outlook: Discipline, Flags & Hidden Edges
The Good
- The Chiefs ranked 27th in penalties per game in home contests.
- The Chiefs recorded the largest home versus road penalty per game discrepancy in 2025, averaging 3.55 more penalties on the road than in games at Arrowhead Stadium.
- Kansas City ranked No. 1 in defensive pass interference beneficiary yardage, with an average of 32.8 yards per infraction. Unfortunately, the overall volume of penalties generated was extremely low for the team last season.
The Bad
- The Chiefs ranked fifth in penalties per game, a major departure from the normally disciplined Kansas City team we have been accustomed to over the past decade.
- Kansas City ended the 2025 season as the No. 1 penalized road team in the NFL.
- The offense ranked 30th in penalties per game in 2024 and skyrocketed to ninth in 2025.
- The Chiefs ranked as the No. 1 penalized fourth-quarter team in 2025, which is completely out of character for a team synonymous with discipline in high-leverage late-game situations throughout their run.
- Only 42.5% of opponent penalties were committed in the second half of games in 2025, the third-lowest percentage in this category behind the Chargers and Jets. Contrast that with the previous three seasons, where 51% of opponent penalties occurred in the second half of contests.
- The two points detailed above led to 58% of overall penalties in the second half of Chiefs’ contests being assessed on Kansas City last season. That represents a major shift from their Super Bowl run from 2022 to 2024, where 47% were called on the Chiefs in the second half of games.
Grade: C
The Chiefs were the latest victim of the Super Bowl loser curse, and they don’t have that historical angle going against them in 2026.
Despite that, Kansas City is as vulnerable as at any time in the Patrick Mahomes era.
The Chiefs enter this season in the unfamiliar position of having to re-establish themselves as contenders.
They have players with championship pedigree, but Chris Jones and Travis Kelce are near the end of their careers, while Mahomes is coming into the season recovering from an ACL injury.
Whether the Chiefs return to form as an AFC powerhouse or they fail for the second consecutive season, there is no doubt they will remain one of the NFL’s most polarizing teams in 2026.
This analysis continues in the 2026 Football Preview
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Warren Sharp’s 600+ page full-color PDF, the 2026 Football Preview, is unlike anything you have read. Stunning visualizations, including new heat maps and stat pages, are built with the reader in mind. Innovative, next-level thought processes abound in every team chapter and article.
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- Team Chapters previews are in-depth, data-driven & full of actionable info
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- Rankings for every positional unit on every team with analysis
- Penalty analysis for all 32 NFL teams
