With a rocket arm, quick feet and a sharp mind, Patrick Mahomes makes plays as if he weren’t human.

It’s ironic because the doubts about Mahomes entering the NFL all stemmed from the system that created him.

“The question seemed to be: Who had come out of that [Air Raid] offense and been successful?” said former NFL general manager Charley Casserly, an analyst for NFL Network. “He was certainly a gunslinger who left the pocket too soon and threw the ball all over the place. You saw raw talent, you didn’t see discipline. And he hadn’t won.”

With an NFL MVP in hand and about to lead the Chiefs into Super Bowl 2020 in his second season as a starter, it seems crazy nine teams passed on drafting Mahomes and another traded out of position to steal him.

Letting him slip is an all-time gaffe. Except … that is three years of hindsight talking and not really what happened.

“I believe the real surprise was how many teams liked him a lot,” said Lance Zierlein, whose detailed scouting reports are a draft perk of NFL.com. “While it feels like there were people missing on him, the reality is there were aggressive teams willing to draft him beyond the standard thought process for where he should go.”

This is not a case of Tom Brady, who was overlooked on the way to the sixth round of the 2000 draft. Seventeen years later, Mahomes, Deshaun Watson and Mitch Trubisky were viewed as the consensus top three quarterbacks in one order or another.

Some of the knocks on Mahomes were out of his control. Texas Tech ran the Air Raid offense, which generates video game-like passing stats in the defense-optional Big 12 Conference.

Now that Mahomes’ college coach, Kliff Kingsbury, and Kyler Murray are paired with the Cardinals, it’s easy to forget …

“There had never been a successful Air Raid quarterback up until that point,” Zierlein said. “You are automatically dealing with, ‘How do we know this guy can read NFL defenses?’ The second problem was he played a little too much Hero Ball. He kind of needed to with the team he had, but he would take some chances that he probably shouldn’t have.”

Gil Brandt, the Hall of Fame personnel executive, handled the draft’s top-prospect green-room invitations in 2017 and tried to persuade Mahomes to attend. There were no character or work ethic concerns to hold back Mahomes, the son of former Major League Baseball pitcher Pat Mahomes.

“I know the young man well,” said Brandt, a Sirius XM NFL Radio host. “He’s a very cordial and cooperative guy. He’s not a bounce-around guy. When you introduce yourself, he’s very attentive.”

The Browns passed on all quarterbacks in favor of pass-rusher Myles Garrett with the No. 1 pick in 2017, and ultimately drafted quarterback DeShone Kizer in the second round. None of their four quarterbacks who spent time on Cleveland’s 2017 roster — Kizer, Kevin Hogan, Cody Kessler or Brock Osweiler — started an NFL game in 2019.

The Bears traded up from No. 3 to No. 2 to secure Trubisky. The Chiefs traded No. 27, a third-rounder and their 2018 first-rounder to the Bills (No. 10) to move up for Mahomes, despite the fact Pro Bowler Alex Smith had led Kansas City to a 12-4 finish.

Chiefs general manager Brett Veach — then No. 2 in the front office — was fixated on Mahomes as a way to elevate from playoff participant to championship contender. He realized public perception — “Is Mahomes a first-round quarterback?” still was a popular question the month of the draft — did not match up with the well-masked demand inside the NFL.

“Give Kansas City credit for pulling the trigger, developing him and building a system for him,” Casserly said. “Just watching tape can’t tell you whether the guy can play. You have to get your hands on him and see how he reacts to things. There is a skill involved in that, and [coach] Andy Reid and his staff are pretty good at it.”

Mahomes landing with Reid’s play-calling and the Chiefs’ cast of speedy playmakers was a perfect storm that began brewing at the NFL Combine, when Mahomes got to the board to read defenses.

It wasn’t that Mahomes was more advanced than expected after playing in the Air Raid — he wasn’t — but his “recall and intelligence were so off the charts,” a source told The Post, that it answered all questions about his ability to digest a pro-style offense.

“Kingsbury could take you or I and make us pretty good quarterbacks,” Brandt said. “That’s what scared people off.

“Mahomes could throw that ball to a spot where the receiver was going to be, but I don’t think anybody thought he had that running ability that we saw last week. I thought he was going to be very good. But I didn’t think he was going to be probably the No. 1 overall player in the league.”

The trap of falling for Mahomes’ physical abilities can blind eyes from seeing some other special qualities. The three-sport high school star played two as a college freshman, but finally gave up baseball as a sophomore.

“This was the first time he went-all in on football and you could see him rapidly get better,” Bills quarterback and Texas Tech teammate Davis Webb said. “He asked a lot of good questions.”

In his sixth college game, in place of an injured Webb against No. 5 Baylor, Mahomes threw for 598 yards and six touchdowns in a loss. It launched him onto the NFL radar and set Webb on a path to graduate transfer to California.

“Wherever he is, high school — I saw him play once — college or the NFL,” Webb said, “it’s all unorthodox the way he plays. But no matter what he is going to put up yards, he is going to score touchdowns and he is going to be a lot of fun to watch.”

A slow start or a serious injury to Smith topped the list of Chiefs’ internal concerns in 2017, a source said.

Really, the fear spread to anything that might prompt outside calls for the rookie quarterback and disrupt the plan to show the kind of developmental patience that was common until a decade ago and now is completely gone.

Mahomes spent his rookie year running the scout team and not worrying about interceptions, per Reid’s instructions. By allowing Mahomes to maintain his aggressiveness, Reid observed what needed to be emphasized when the playbook changed hands after Smith was traded.

“There was so much conversation about, was the Air Raid going to translate?” said Webb, who was drafted by the Giants in the third round in 2017. “We talked all the time about how frustrating it was, but we both knew we had a lot to learn, and we were excited about getting somewhere they believe in you. I think he broke the mold a little bit.”

Agent Leigh Steinberg told the Washington Post he thinks the Saints would have taken his client Mahomes at No. 11. Coach Bruce Arians admits he would have grabbed Mahomes for the Cardinals at No. 13. The Giants were very interested, according to a team source, but he was never making it to No. 23.

Mahomes still takes risks, throws off balance and commits other quarterbacking sins. But his improvement and the talent around him usually leads those off-script plays to the highlight reel.

“The story here is the Chiefs had a plan and a process and stuck with their plan and process,” Zierlein said. “It’s the ultimate storyline of drafting for projection: This is who he’s going to be and this is how we are going to get him there. Now it’s bearing all the fruit.”

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