Patrick Mahomes is pissed.

In the waning seconds of the Kansas City Chiefs loss to the Buffalo Bills in Week 14, Mahomes could be found on the home team’s sideline ranting and throwing his helmet in a clear display of anger—the sort of emotional outburst and rage that Chiefs Kingdom has rarely seen from their franchise quarterback.

Not only was it another loss in the books for the Chiefs, who have lost four of their last six games to fall to 8-5 in the standings, but it was a heartbreaker that disappeared from the Chiefs’ grasp on the final drive. In fact, they came oh-so-close to celebrating a come-from-behind win over the Bills after being down 20-17 thanks to a 49-yard pass from Mahomes to tight end Travis Kelce (to wide receiver Kadarius Toney).

But then it was called back.

On the magical play that ended up not counting, Kelce hit Toney with a lateral to take the pass from Mahomes the rest of the way to the end zone on a score that would have put the Chiefs up by 4 points. Instead, the Chiefs had the play called back thanks to an offensive offsides call. Yeah, offensive offsides. Here was Mahomes’s response:

After the game, Mahomes gave Josh Allen a quick idea of what he thought of that series.

If you’re wondering how all of this happened, you’re not alone. After the game, figures like Mahomes and head coach Andy Reid, whose press conferences are typically filled with boring coach-speak or player-speak taking all the blame and saying “we’ll do better” after each loss was suddenly flooded with emotion and criticism.

Per NFL reporter Jeff Darlington, Mahomes said, “It’s tough to swallow. Not only from me, and football in general, to take away greatness like that, for a guy like Travis to make a play like that, you want to see the guys on the field decide the game. They’re human. They make mistakes. But every week, we’re talking about something… It’s the call. Just in that moment. Not for myself. To have a flag change the outcome of the game. I’ve never had offensive offsides called. If it does, they warn you. There wasn’t a warning the entire game. And then you make a call like that in the final minute? Another game, we’re talking about the refs. It’s not what we want for the NFL. It’s not what we want for football.”

Reid chimed in after the game backing up what Mahomes said, about generally getting a heads-up from the officials.

Andy Reid on the Toney offsides: “Usually I get a warning before something like that happens. A bit embarrassing in the National Football League for that to take place.” — clarified “I didn’t have a protractor out there, but a bit embarrassing.” #Chiefs

— Harold R. Kuntz (@HaroldRKuntz3) December 11, 2023

In a way, it might be good to see Mahomes so pissed, since the Chiefs had spent most of the game shooting themselves in the foot with penalties and turnovers. The final difference of three points is hardly blamed on the refs alone there.

This anger has been building for Mahomes. And he’s said all the right things for weeks but sometimes it’s good to yell it out.

— Geoff Schwartz (@geoffschwartz) December 11, 2023

We can only hope Mahomes and the Chiefs can channel this against a soft regular-season schedule from this point forward.