Patrick Mahomes, Chiefs ‘haven’t played well’ — and they’re still undefeated. Ouch.

ATLANTA — In most cases, when a team has not played well in one of its games, when the quarterback is disappointed with his own play, when the team allows two red-zone drives in the final five minutes, that team struggles toward a losing record.

And then there are the Kansas City Chiefs, who endured all that misery… and are still 3-0, one of five undefeated teams left in the league.

The two-time reigning world champions played just well enough to win Sunday night, beating the Atlanta Falcons 22-17 in a game that hung in the balance until the final 56 seconds. Without their star running back, facing a Falcons team that was alternately lethal and self-destructive, Kansas City leaned heavily on their experience to deny Atlanta a win that would have eluded most teams.

“Yeah, we still have a lot of things to work on,” head coach Andy Reid said after the game, without elaborating.

He praised the work of his defense, which forced Atlanta into two turnovers on downs inside the Chiefs’ 13-yard line and in the game’s final minutes. But he left unsaid Kansas City’s problems, such as its continued difficulty getting the ball to Travis Kelce, or missteps like a three-and-out late in the fourth period with the game on the line. Reid has certainly noticed them, but he’s not about to show his hand on KC’s foibles in a public forum.

Patrick Mahomes, on the other hand, doesn’t hold back.

“We didn’t play well, I mean, really, all three games,” he said after Sunday night’s game. “We were able to win, (and) that says something about the character of the team, the determination, how we’ve been in these situations. But I’ll speak — especially offensively and myself, I feel like I didn’t play very well.”

Mahomes finished with 217 yards passing on 26 of 39 attempts, with two touchdowns and an interception. He had little trouble moving the ball in bite-sized chunks; Kansas City doubled Atlanta in time of possession for most of the game, finishing with a lead for nearly 10 minutes, 34:57 to 25:03.

But Mahomes struggled to connect on the long passes. His longest was a 27-yarder to Rashee Rice. He threw an ugly interception in the end zone to perennial foe Justin Simmons on Kansas City’s first drive. The Chiefs leaned heavily on Harrison Butker’s toe and fired three field goals over four possessions in the second and third quarters. Mahomes had little trouble finding the open man, but there was a very un-Mahomes vibe to his play.

He knows that vibes don’t show up in the box score or even in advanced stats. But he knows something is wrong.

“It’s not a statistic thing,” Mahomes said of his frustrations. “I just feel like I’m missing opportunities when they’re there and not throwing the ball exactly where I want it to be.”

“He’s the best quarterback I’ve ever played with,” Rice said. “So, you know, when he feels like he didn’t have a great game, I feel the same way.” (For the record, Rice led all receivers with 12 catches for 110 yards and a touchdown.)

The defense held up its end of the bargain, stopping the Falcons on charge after charge. Linebacker Nick Bolton made the stop of the game, catching Atlanta’s Bijan Robinson in the backfield on fourth-and-1 with less than a minute left to kill the Falcons’ last hopes. He then gave all the credit to the Chiefs’ weekly preparation.

“Two minutes, four minutes, whatever we got, man, go out there and execute,” Bolton said. “Just trust the work.”

The Chiefs have won three games by a combined 13 points. But the important thing in that sentence isn’t “13,” it’s “won.” The NFL is in chaos right now. Teams projected to make the Super Bowl are 1-2. Teams projected to struggle are undefeated. But the Chiefs and Mahomes remain the constant, the standard, the target.

The Chiefs have two of the most unpredictable teams of 2024 — the Chargers (2-1) and Saints (2-1) — coming into their bye week, followed by a Super Bowl rematch with San Francisco. Playing as they have thus far could cost them all three games, or it could see them win all three games … but they’re unlikely to pull off a blowout anytime soon with this kind of good-enough-is-good-enough ball.

“Luckily for me, I’m not playing my best football and we’re still winning,” Mahomes said. “I’ve got to get better to make the offense better.”

The fact that Kansas City is, by the star’s own admission, struggling — and still winning — should be a warning sign to the rest of the league. If the Chiefs can get through this rough patch and still win games, well, a three-peat might be the least of the league’s problems with Kansas City.