Xavier Worthy — Week 2: Five Catches, Twenty-Five Yards
2026 NFL Season · Half-PPR Scoring · Monday, Sep 21
Worthy caught five of seven targets for 25 yards and a one-yard touchdown on second and goal with 2:28 left in the half that put the Chiefs ahead 17–13. Sixteen of the 25 yards came on his first catch, and he was not targeted on Patrick Mahomes's final 15 throws. Through two games he has 43 yards on 13 targets, in a 33–30 overtime win over the Colts.
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13 to 10, Colts, two 28 left in the half, second and goal at the Indianapolis one. Patrick Mahomes threw short right to Xavier Worthy for one yard and the touchdown. +0.9 expected points added — expected points added is what a play was worth given down, distance and field position — and 3.7 points of win probability, the chance of winning the game after the play against before it. The snap before, Worthy had caught a ball thrown behind the line and taken it four yards from the five to the one. The extra point made it 17 to 13. It is his first touchdown of the season.
The line: seven targets, five catches, 25 yards, one touchdown, two first downs, +0.4 expected points on the targets. The catches went 16, six, four, one and −2. The 16 was Kansas City's second offensive snap, first and 10 at the Indianapolis 45 with seven 43 left in the first quarter, short middle, 14 in the air, right after Kenneth Walker's 19-yard run. The −2 was first and 10 at the Indianapolis 14 with a minute 28 left in the third quarter, short right, pushed out at the 16. The two incompletions: short middle on second and nine on that opening drive, and deep right on first and 10 at the Indianapolis 32 with two-oh-six left in the third, 26 yards in the air, his one deep target. 40 air yards on the seven throws, 26 of them on the deep ball that fell incomplete. No third-down targets. Five targets before halftime, two after, and the −2 was the last one: Mahomes threw 15 more times before the game ended, and none went to Worthy.
Seven targets were third on the Chiefs, behind Travis Kelce's 11 and Walker's 10 one ahead of Rashee Rice's six, on 43 credited targets.
Back in June the preview leaned watchlist on Worthy — the 40-ninth receiver off the board, priced for a bounce-back it could not underwrite after a season played in a shoulder harness — and named the September target split between him and Rice as the thing to watch. Week 1 the split was six to two in Worthy's favor, and the six produced 18 yards and an interception; that episode called it volume without conversion. Sunday night the split was seven to six, and the conversion half did not change: 25 yards on seven targets against Rice's 83 on six. Two games: 13 targets, eight catches, 43 yards, one touchdown from a yard out. Two games settle little, but both say the same thing, and the late-game throws went elsewhere. The Chiefs are at the Dolphins on Sunday the 20-seventh.
_Data via nflverse._
When Xavier Worthy's week moves the numbers, you'll know — every episode, in one weekly email.
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