The AFC West rival Kansas City Chiefs and Las Vegas Raiders meet for the first of two times this season in the Sunday night NFL Week 10 game. Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs opened as 2.5-point favourites on the NFL odds with a total of 52 points.

NFL Point Spread and Betting Analysis

Kansas City will host Las Vegas on Dec. 12 to wrap up the season series, although it’s not impossible the AFC West rivals meet in the playoffs. This writer tends to doubt the Raiders make it, though.

Last season, the teams split with each winning on the road. The game in Las Vegas was tremendous with Kansas City prevailing 35-31 on a Patrick Mahomes 22-yard touchdown pass to Travis Kelce with 28 seconds left. The Raiders had taken a 31-28 lead with 1:43 to go on a Derek Carr to Jason Witten TD pass. The game was back-and-forth all day.

The Raiders have been in the news plenty over the past few weeks and not for good reasons: Former coach Jon Gruden resigning in disgrace, 2020 first-round receiver Henry Ruggs being involved in a DUI fatality and released, and then this week 2020 first-round cornerback Damon Arnette released after video surfaced over the weekend of Arnette making death threats while brandishing firearms. He hadn’t been able to stay out of trouble in his brief NFL career.

That 2020 draft was supposed to be the foundation for the Raiders to build on with those two first-round choices, but it has become an utter disaster.

The home team is 7-2 against the spread in the past nine meetings.

Kansas City Chiefs

Kansas City caught a huge break in facing the Packers on Sunday without Aaron Rodgers, but that once-vaunted Chiefs offence struggled again in a 13-7 win – that’s three straight games scoring 20 points or fewer.

Former MVP favourite Patrick Mahomes just doesn’t look the same and is among the INT leaders with 10, although his streak of seven straight games with at least one ended. The Chiefs aren’t really running the ball well with top RB Clyde Edwards-Helaire on injured reserve. The defence is so-so at best, although it played well against Packers backup QB Jordan Love.

Recent trade acquisition Melvin Ingram had four QB pressures. Sunday was the 226^th regular-season victory in the career of Coach Andy Reid, matching Curly Lambeau for the fifth-most in league history. The Chiefs are 2-8 ATS in their past 10 as favourites.

Las Vegas Raiders

The Raiders won their first two games after Jon Gruden resigned but it sure looked as if that situation and the Henry Ruggs situation caught up to the team this past Sunday in a 23-16 loss at a bad Giants team. Without Ruggs, the Raiders have one of the worst groups of wide receivers in the NFL, although the team has signed speedster DeSean Jackson after he was cut by the Rams. He should debut here.

Derek Carr was picked twice by the Giants, one returned for a TD. He also was strip-sacked while driving for a potential game-tying touchdown late in the game. Carr entered the game with only five turnovers all season. The Raiders are oddly now 3-16 in their first game after the bye week since 2003. Las Vegas is 7-3 ATS in its past 10 vs. the AFC West.

Who Will Win Chiefs vs. Raiders?