One of the biggest problem areas for the Kansas City Chiefs this season has been finding consistency at the punt returner position.
Part of the issue has been injuries, but another part of it has been the coaching staff’s insistence on using Skyy Moore as a punt returner. He’s been learning the position on the fly and trying to battle through his struggles. His muffed punt against the Colts in Week 3 proved to be extremely costly. He’s had two muffed punts since, including the most recent one in Week 12 against the Rams.
On Monday, Chiefs HC Andy Reid took responsibility for the latest gaffe.
“We’ve kinda put Skyy (Moore) in and we were trying to bring him along with the punt return stuff, but he had a hiccup again yesterday,” Reid said. “We’ll take that responsibility as a coaching staff. I was proud of him for stepping up, he ended up with five receptions. He had the one right after that. He’s a competitive kid and he was crushed after the other (muffed punt), but listen that’s my responsibility. So I’ll take that. We’ll see where we go forward here with the punt return. Again, I was proud of him.”
During the game, the Chiefs replaced Moore with Justin Watson, who also played the most offensive snaps of any receiver in Week 12. Asked about Watson’s performance and who the team might go to in place of Moore while Mecole Hardman and Kadarius Toney are injured, Reid suggested that Watson could be the guy.
“Justin (Watson), he looked like he caught the ball fairly easy back there and comfortable,” Reid said. “I haven’t talked to (Dave) Toub about it yet. We’ll see where we go with it moving forward, but he seemed to be a pretty good catcher back there.”
It stands to reason that Watson could see less work on offense moving forward, taking up punt return duties until either Toney or Hardman returns. JuJu Smith-Schuster returning healthy in Week 12 gives them the flexibility to do that.
All-in-all the special teams struggles at punt returner and in other units appear to be an unintended consequence of the team’s youth movement this season.
“We’re playing a number of young guys,” Reid said. “We’re anticipating things will get better. We’ve gotten better in a number of areas. So, we’ll just keep working through it. As far as the returner thing goes, I’ve been through that before. Again, we’re not going to — I’m not going to put that on Skyy (Moore). We’ve asked him to learn that and go in there and do it. We gave him a second chance to do it, it didn’t work out as we hoped.”
No matter who they end up going with at punt returner, Reid is confident they’ll see improvement there moving forward. He also has confidence that Dave Toub and the rest of the coaching staff will get the decision right.
“We’ll figure it out,” Reid said. “We’ll get it right. Dave (Toub) is as good as there is. We’ll get things straightened out there.”
