KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- Asked this week about the Kansas City Chiefs' Week 7 game against the Oakland Raiders, cornerback Terrance Mitchell said he had trouble remembering what happened last week against the Jets, much less in a game from two months ago.
"I'm a cornerback," Mitchell said. "I have short-term memory. I'm ready for the next game and the next play."
That's the right attitude for a player at his position to have. But Kansas City's cornerbacks haven't looked recently like they've been able to put a bad play behind them. One big pass play often follows another, which is why the Chiefs have allowed more passing yards than all but four other NFL teams.
That was particularly true of the game against the Jets. Quarterback Josh McCown threw for 331 yards and led the Jets on a 75-yard touchdown drive in the final minutes that provided the winning points.
The drive took seven minutes because the Chiefs couldn't get the Jets off the field. Kansas City committed four penalties and allowed New York to convert four times on third down.
At the back end of the defense, the Chiefs at times looked beaten down. On one of those third-down plays, cornerback Steven Nelson allowed Jets receiver Jermaine Kearse to catch a short slant pass.
Nelson could have prevented a big play by making the tackle at the Chiefs' 40. But he whiffed and Kearse wasn't brought down until safety Steven Terrell got him at the Kansas City 5.
Nelson also had two holding penalties on the drive. Another Chiefs cornerback, Marcus Peters, was so disgusted with things that he threw the flag after one of Nelson's penalties into the stands and then inexplicably left the playing field before the game was finished. For those actions, he was suspended by the team for Sunday's game against the Raiders at Arrowhead Stadium.
"Like we tell them all the time, 'Occasionally, you're going to get beat,'" Chiefs defensive coordinator Bob Sutton said. "There's going to be somebody that runs a good route and the quarterback sticks it in. That's why you've got to contest as many throws as you possibly can. That's the real challenge in this league. If you don't, these quarterbacks are too good. It'll be like out here 7-on-7 for them.
"Everybody goes through those things. You can't panic. You can't start thinking, 'What if?' You've got to trust all the training that you've put in, all the effort you've put in, all the technique you've been taught and grab hold of that, rely on that. That gets you out of it."
Nelson declined an interview request after the Jets game and hasn't made himself available to answer questions this week. But his frustrations were evident on his two holding penalties, in which he bearhugged tight end Austin Seferian-Jenkins and later tackled a receiver without the ball.
His grab of Seferian-Jenkins came on a third-down play and allowed the Jets to continue the drive.
"That was just for him trying to do too much too fast and not trusting his technique," Sutton said. "He needed to let that play play out. I don't think [Seferian-Jenkins] was going to be a major factor in that play. But he grabbed him. It was a holding [penalty], no question about it."
The Chiefs need Nelson to rebound. Oakland quarterback Derek Carr threw for 417 yards and three touchdowns against the Chiefs in that October game, and that was with Peters in the lineup. Somebody will have to make some plays for the Chiefs at the back end of their defense, and Nelson is a logical candidate.
"Steven is probably one of the most competitive people here," Sutton said. "I don't know if we have anybody who practices any harder than he does. He fights you all the way to the ground in practice to get a ball out.
"I've told him, 'You're a good football player. These things have a way of balancing out. Just stay with it.' I asked him, 'Are you practicing hard? Are you preparing hard? Are you playing hard?' The answers are yes, yes and yes in his case. He's just got to keep playing when things don't go his way."