for how well one should perform in later possessions. There's a lot of noise and chance. Sometimes one will score early and not late, sometimes late and not early.

It's obviously an advantage to have an early lead because if you score at your average rate in the second half, you should maintain that lead. But when there's only a handful of possessions, otherwise statistically insignificant deviations for a single game end up determining the outcome.

But whether there was an early lead isn't really the point. The point is total points. 19 regulation points looks pretty average for what the Chiefs gave up all year, though they dominated on defense in the two playoff games. Same for the 20 points scored in 2020. It was not impressive in light of the overall 2019-20 Chief results, but it was quite good when looking at the Chiefs last five games (including playoffs).

On the other hand, 28 points against the Pats in 2017 was like the third most the Pats gave up all year. Sometimes scores come early, sometimes late. I'm not inclined to read more into it than that. Though I welcome a deeper look, as some have, into play breakdowns. Certainly three straight 3-and-outs can be looked differently than sustained drives that just didn't hit a key third down conversion.