AFC Notes: Patrick Mahomes, Antonio Pierce, Russell Wilson, Broncos, Chiefs, Raiders

Broncos

• The Athletic reports that an NFLPA letter told the Broncos their threat to bench QB Russell Wilson if he refused to change his contract was illegal and violated the CBA, which could result in legal action being taken against the team.
• Per Chris Tomasson, Broncos TE Greg Dulcich is not expected to play in the final game and will finish out the season on injured reserve.
• Broncos HC Sean Payton was asked about Dulcich’s medical future: “It’s something that our medical people & everyone involved are working hard on Getting to that proper weight strength & all the things that allow him to stay healthy He’s a tremendous worker so he’s going to do whatever it takes.” (Tomasson)
• Payton added that RB Jaleel McLaughlin will continue to see an increased workload in the final game of the season. (Tomasson)

Chiefs

Chiefs QB Patrick Mahomes said the team has to be more consistent if they hope to make another Super Bowl run.

“I mean, obviously, the season hasn’t been – we’re not winning this in Week 12 or Week 13 like we have before,” Mahomes said, via Chiefs Wire. “We had to battle through adversity and find a way to win this game, but it’s not over. We have to continue to get better and better; we understand that. Kind of the motto of this season at the end of it has been a good game and a bad game, so how can we sustain and get stuff going and continue to build off this momentum and get that momentum going into the playoffs? Like I said, now you’re in the playoffs, it’s one game single elimination, and I think we can go out there and compete with anybody.”

Mahomes explained the importance of being able to hit deep shots in order to open up things underneath for TE Travis Kelce.

“I think guys just did a great job of attacking the defense,” Mahomes said. “I think at the end of the day, it’s me trusting those guys to go out there and make plays happen, and I put it out there, and guys made a lot of plays happen. That’s just going to have to continue, to build trust that I can go and do that, and I think that’ll help open Travis (Kelce) up because there’s so much attention on him in the middle of the field. I think if we can show that we can go over the top and hit these deep passes, it’ll open up him and then we can kind of battle off that throughout the rest of the year.”

Raiders

• Raiders interim HC Antonio Pierce on the current state of the franchise: “In these 8 or 9 weeks, it’s been a solid foundation that we’ve built as a team and as an organization that we can look on and say, ‘Okay, those are things that went well and there are some other things that we can do better.'” (Vic Tafur)