The most impressive thing about Patrick Mahomes isn’t what he does. It’s what he doesn’t do.

Mahomes rarely makes negative plays. He does bad things at a lower rate than just about every other quarterback in the NFL, which unlocks everything else. That might sound elementary, but it’s remarkable given all the chances he takes and all the Kansas City Chiefs ask of him. Ultimately, his superpower is on-the-run risk management, maximizing his immense natural talent while minimizing the ways his gun-slinging can burn the team.

“It’s a gift,” Chiefs right tackle Jawaan Taylor said.

The Chiefs’ run this postseason is a perfect example. Mahomes hasn’t vanquished foes with physical brilliance. In three games, he has topped 300 total yards once (barely) and passed for just four touchdowns. But he has complemented the Chiefs’ dominant defense by protecting the ball and battling for field position. He has dropped back 112 times and has had zero interceptions and zero fumbles and has taken two sacks for a grand total of 11 yards.

In the run-up to Sunday’s Super Bowl against San Francisco and Brock Purdy, his counterpart on the 49ers, the wrong quarterback might be getting the label of “game manager.”

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Yet this is who Mahomes has always been. He has had one of the lowest rates of negative plays (interceptions, sacks and fumbles) every season since he became the starter in 2018. In 2023, it was 6.8 percent, the lowest in the NFL, and even when Mahomes did make mistakes, the advanced stats suggest they hurt less than the average negative play. This Chiefs team, with the feeblest offense of his era, has taught him the value of patience, of sometimes playing for field position rather than points.

“I have that mentality where I want to score every single time,” he said after beating Miami in the first round of the playoffs. “I played in the Big 12 [Conference]; I want to score every single time. But when your defense is playing [well] like that, you have to find the best way to win the football game.”

By now, defensive coordinators have a standard game plan for Mahomes: They mostly play zone coverage, often with two high safeties, and don’t blitz. The conservative approach aims to slow Mahomes, not beat him. If he grows impatient, if he tries to play hero ball, defenses can create a negative play. The ploy worked for the 49ers in Super Bowl LIV; Mahomes had two fumbles and two picks and was sacked four times. But the Chiefs won anyway, which was an anomaly; when Mahomes has had negative plays in the postseason, they’ve historically been his team’s kryptonite.

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In 17 playoff games, Mahomes has had five or more negative plays four times. He has lost every game except that Super Bowl.

In March, Kansas City signed journeyman Blaine Gabbert to back up Mahomes. Gabbert spent the previous three seasons in Tampa with Tom Brady. But during his first practice with the Chiefs, Gabbert saw what made Mahomes special.

“He has a very unique ability to see the field outside the pocket; he’s one of one with the ability to do that,” Gabbert said. “His field of vision is phenomenal; his play-extending ability is phenomenal.”

One day, Gabbert said, he asked Mahomes how he saw passing windows on the run. The best Mahomes could say was that he “feels space,” that breaking the pocket turns football into basketball, that he’s essentially running pick and rolls with tight end Travis Kelce. Gabbert called Mahomes “a unicorn” — not just for his vision but for how he’s able to use it.

Maybe the best way to capture Mahomes’s magic is during broken plays. He’s calm in chaos, avoiding defenders by sprinting, juking, spinning, stepping up or rolling out. He can look like a contortionist with 360-degree vision. But Washington Commanders right tackle Andrew Wylie, who blocked for Mahomes for five seasons, said it starts with understanding what the defense wants to do before the snap.

“He would go into the blitz meeting and essentially run the show,” Wylie said. “It’s pretty cool. His ability to recognize coverages, pressures, certain alignments by different guys lets him get the ball out quick, like he knows where his [answers] are.”

Mahomes’s spatial awareness and athleticism allow him to extend plays without taking many sacks. Sacks are subtler negatives than turnovers but torpedo drives. Mahomes dances away from pressure by pump-faking rushers or jumping to buy himself an extra split second — and then he has the arm fluidity and core strength to complete a pass.

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In the past decade, no quarterback has been better at avoiding sacks when pressured, per data from TruMedia.

“The tough part about Patrick Mahomes is it’s not the first three seconds of a play,” Denver safety Justin Simmons said. “You can probably cover that. It’s the next three seconds, when he extends it and keeps it alive.”

Since the last time Mahomes lost in the playoffs, in the AFC championship game against Cincinnati in January 2022, he has dramatically cut down on negative plays. In six games — 223 dropbacks — he has five sacks, one fumble and no interceptions. It has been a key part of his growth and of taking this Chiefs team this far.

In the locker room after beating Miami, Gabbert said Kansas City’s game plan emphasized field position because the wind chill was minus-30. The Chiefs struggled in the red zone but made field goals from 21, 26, 28 and 32 yards. On that day, it was enough.

“Part of playing the position of quarterback is not to take negative plays, especially in the game that we just had,” he said.

During the Super Bowl, to appreciate what makes Mahomes great, try looking in the negative space.