It is just there has been that despair. Too much of it. That's what this series is all about.
Some may reasonably say move on, forget about it, today's a new day. Yeah, I understand the sentiment, I do. And I will always be optimistic about the Chiefs, even through the worst. But some add okay then what's the point of all this going over the past. It is simple, this blog series is about saying there is something somewhere somehow that impacts the Kansas City Chiefs in a wholly detrimental way, and I'm just trying to look at it, for the exclusive purpose of seeing good Chiefs things from it, that's the point. As I shared in the previous post, I confess there's a lot I don't know and there're a lot of people I have nothing against.
For instance Clark.
Here's a very hopeful thing -- an update of sorts. As any Chiefs fan knows Alex Smith was traded to the Redskins for a third round pick and a fine D-back. Now I'd be happy if we got a box of Fig Newtons for him -- nothing against Smith, really, but he was incapable of getting us to the promised land, for a lot of reasons. That's been hashed to death, not going to get into it. Pat Mahomes is good to go out there, let's get that happening already.
I will say, however, that I'm thrilled we got that pick and a terrific coverage guy on defense -- apparently I'd heard Redskins fans were furious they gave him up. Cool, we got him now.
Thing is, I'd heard later that Clark vetoed any trade that would've sent Smith to a divisional foe -- read that: Broncos. This is a terrific move. It means Clark is being a leader, making the right call here, and I believe it is.
Unless... Did Clark actually contact the Broncos? Really? Could he have said, "Look, Alex Smith is a phenomenal talent with at least a couple years left. What can you offer?" If they asked, "What do you want?" could we have just said, "We'll take the next two No. 1's, Demaryius Thomas, and Chris Harris"? See, could they have said that? Unlikely, but did we try? Did we ask for that and see what happens? Would half that deal be better than what we got from Washington?
Now maybe they did do that, maybe the Washington deal was the best we could get -- and I believe that deal was pretty good to be honest.
And I'd like to think Clark is blowing out the "Hunt" thing, the fruits of which will reveal itself in all its glory in next year's divisional playoff game at Arrowhead -- and beyond.
For you see, there is still Hunt.
There it is. Look. You cannot deny looking at it. Go ahead, try. Try to avert your eyes, you can't. But that's okay because again, the only reason to view the ugliness is so maybe we can identify what is going on that is making it happen. I have some ideas, some legitimate ones, ones I've shared a number of times here, and we'll get to some of them. For now, some more history. I want to do this just to show you, would you indulge me? It is also good for the therapy, thanks for joining me.
I had a hypothesis, and I went about testing it. It is as follows.
The Chiefs have the worst playoff record of any team, particularly in relation to its regular season record.
I went about compiling all the NFL teams franchise regular season win-loss percentages and their playoff win-loss percentages and compared them all. Would the Chiefs be the worst? Let's test it. Here's what I discovered.
First of all, some teams have hundreds and hundreds of games played in their long histories -- the most are by teams like the Bears, Packers, Lions, and believe it or not, the Cardinals which have all been around since the early 1920's. Comparatively other teams like the Ravens or Texans have not played many games at all.
The best overall regular season records are as follows, along with their winning percentages:
1. Dallas .573
2. Green Bay .567
3. Chicago .564
4. Miami .559
5. New England .559
6. Minnesota .547
7. San Francisco .544
8. Baltimore .541
9. New York Giants .540
10. Denver .538
11. Oakland .529
12. Pittsburgh .529
13. Indianapolis .528
14. Kansas City .524
15. Cleveland .511
16. Seattle .507
17. Washington .504
These are all the teams with winning records. Note the first part of my hypothesis is proven:
The Chiefs have actually been, overall, a pretty decent team during the regular season.
What is striking is that even though they rank 14th, they have been that good. They have a winning percentage pretty comparable to Pittsburgh's and Oakland's, even though those two teams have a much greater reputation for football success. One reason for Pittsburgh's lower-than-expected number is it was absolutely atrocious for years upon years before it began its run in the early 70's. Even so that run has netted them 36 postseason wins including six Super Bowl titles. Oakland's is a bit depressed because they were very bad when the AFL started and have been pretty bad over the past several years. Even so the Raiders have 25 postseason wins and three Super Bowl titles.
The Chiefs? They have nine. Nine postseason wins total total total.
Just before I did this data compilation, I started thinking, huh, you know, the Chiefs have had quite a number of winning seasons! My brain did a little mental inventory of their regular season history, and voila! There it was.
The '60's. During the 60's they dominated the AFL, and they were still really pretty good in the early 70's. Did you know they had winning records from 1970 to 1973 but only made the playoffs once in that time?
The '70's and '80's. They stank in the late 70's, but had that splendid year in 1981, then again in 1986, and in and around all that they were mediocre, sporting 8-8 marks in 1980 and 1984 and an 8-7-1 mark in 1989 -- not horrible by any means. In fact I'd always remembered that in that 1984 season four of the Chiefs losses were by a total of five points. Neat.
The '90's. We all know how dominant they were in the 90's, winning more regular season games than any team but the Bills. Yep, for review, the Chiefs were better regular season-wise in that decade than the Cowboys (three Super Bowl titles), the Broncos (two), the 49ers, Packers, Giants, and Redskins (one each). The Chiefs won a whopping three playoff games total over the course of that decade.
The '00's and beyond. We had an 8-8 season in 2002, but then exploded to 13-3 in '03, adding more winning seasons in '05 and '06. We thoroughly sucked from '07 to '09 and again in the very notorious 2012, but had a fine season in 2010. And of course we've had a winning season every year since 2013 -- five straight years.
To boot, we have a winning record against every other team in the AFC West. We've also had eleven seasons of winning records when we did not make the playoffs. That seems like a lot, but I simply haven't looked at the other teams in this area to see if it is or not. I'm sure there are a quite a few times 9-7 teams have not made the playoffs, I got that, but eleven times for a single team in their history? I'd have to think that ranks pretty high to be honest with you.
Every once in a while I hear an announcer, mostly during a television broadcast, speak about THE STORIED HISTORY OF THE KANSAS CITY CHIEFS. You know what I feel about every time I hear that? I chafe. It is uncomfortable. I think, "Uggh, he's just saying that. I know our history is actually really crappy to be honest with you. I know our history of postseason chokes is legendary -- how could he say such a thing?"
But you know, our regular season history is actually pretty stellar! It's just I viscerally feel that it doesn't quite justify the ingratiating remarks made by announcers...
And it doesn't change what's happened to this team in the postseason.
That leads to the second part of the hypothesis. How does this regular season success compare to our postseason failures, and I'm venturing to say it is the worst, by far, and any other team. The yawning chasm between our regular season success and our postseason failures is the largest, that's what I say. Let's see...
Here are the rankings for postseason winning percentage, from worst on down. I'm not going very far because the Chiefs appear so soon, of course.
1. Cincinnati .263 (What? A team worse than the Chiefs?! We'll get to that, stay tuned...)
2. Kansas City .333
3. Detroit .350
4. Los Angeles Chargers .393
5. Tampa Bay .400
The numerical difference percentage-wise from regular to postseason for the Chiefs is an earth-shattering .191. That's pretty major. Here are the rankings in size of differences:
1. Cincinnati .194
2. Kansas City .191
3. Minnesota .139
4. Detroit .110
5. Los Angeles Chargers .105
Again these are measured drops from how they did in the regular season to how they did in the postseason. Interesting that Minnesota comes in after the Chiefs on the good regular season-bad postseason flunky list, but the difference is that Minnesota has still won 20 playoff games in its history (to 29 losses). Yes the Vikings have had crushing playoff (and Super Bowl!) losses, but their regular season record is so good (6th in NFL history!) that this make sense. I also can't help but think about how Minnesota was most notorious for so disrespectfully shafting Lamar Hunt when the AFL started -- I just wonder if there is something about that in the mix.
Let's talk about the other sore festering thumb that's shoved into all of this: Cincinnati.
The Bengals right now are riding a seven-game losing streak in the playoffs. Their latest loss, a Wild Card Game for the 2015 season, was a disaster -- they were comfortably leading Pittsburgh late when Vontaze Burfict and Adam "Pacman" Jones committed the most egregious personal foul penalties that essentially cost them the game. Ironically this game was the one played on the same day right after the Chiefs won their only postseason game in 25 years. Huh, an odd connection between the most brutal playoff teams ever.
But look at this team, the Cincinnati Bengals. What is their history like? I don't know 98% of it, but I do know some. And I surely can't say one thing or another about certain things, but I can write about my thoughts anyway.
The Bengals originated in 1966 by Paul Brown, who'd wanted to have his own franchise after he did amazingly innovative things for the NFL with the Cleveland Browns (not named after him). With his coaching skill Brown led the team to several pro football championships in the 1940's and 1950's. With a different coach the Brown-built Browns team even won the NFL title in 1964.
But that was the end for the Browns. They have never been to a Super Bowl and this past season they finished 0-16, one of the few teams ever to go completely winless in a season.
The very interesting thing is in 1995 owner Art Modell considered the Browns were going nowhere in Cleveland, and he moved the team to Baltimore completely reinventing the team as the Ravens. (A newer Browns version was created in 1999 and that is the one in the league right now.) Here's the interesting part.
The Ravens have been phenomenally successful in the postseason.
In fact virtually right outta the gate in 2000, the spankin' new Baltimore Ravens won the Super Bowl. They did it again in 2012, and each time they had to win four postseason games, entering as a Wild Card team and running the table. The Ravens actually have the very best postseason winning percentage of any team in NFL history, a .652 clip. To amplify this I looked at the records of these teams in first game playoff games, whether Wild Card or Divisional.
The Bengals are 3-11 in first playoff games in their history. Yes, they've only had three years of their history when they've even won a playoff game at all. They did go to the Super Bowl in two of those years, losing to the 49ers both times, which represents another intriguing twist to all of this which I'll get to in a minute.
Meanwhile the Ravens are 8-2 in first playoff games. 8-2! Oh the envy of Chiefs fans the world-round. Thing is, I then thought, huh, I wonder what the Ravens regular season record was for each of those eight wins... I should compare it to the Chiefs regular season record for each of their 14 first game losses.
Yes, you read that right. The Chiefs have 14 first game losses in their postseason history (make sure you vomit with the window open please). The Chiefs have a 6-14 record in first postseason games. Yet another stomach-churning truth -- they've only enjoyed a pathetically scant six years (of 58 years in existence) when they've won at least a single playoff game, and one of those was that 1962 AFL Championship when they were the Texans. Otherwise, yep, there it is, '66, '69, '91, '93, and '15, tha's it. Ughck.
So, what is the Chiefs regular season record in those 14 years? Average: 10.9-4.7. Pretty close to an 11-5 record each of the 14 times they went into the playoffs and lost straight away. The Ravens? Regular season record for each of their 8 wins? 10.8-5.2.
Yeah.
Uggggck.
It is pretty close, but still.
The Chiefs have been better. The Chiefs went into the playoffs 14 times (of 20 all together) with a better record on average than the Ravens and lost each time. The Ravens on the other hand went into the playoffs 8 times (of 10 all together) with a worse record on average than the Chiefs and won each time.
Now yes I did kind of cherry-pick these two teams to compare, but hey, I do need rich meaningful Chiefs commiseration, that's the whole point of this. And I do believe much of this is something I've shared a number of times before, and that is for most of the Ravens success they've had Joe Flacco, a very fine drafted and developed quarterback. (Just point-of-fact, in six first-playoff-games Flacco is 6-0 -- he has never lost a first-playoff-game.) The Chiefs on the other hand have had throw-in QB's (as fine as some have been!) and none have ever been able to get us far in the playoffs. I do believe this little fact is instrumental as to why. It is not everything, there are certainly other factors.
Like a bit more of the history. Yes, more Chiefs in a moment, but I simply have to expound a bit more on this Browns-Bengals-Ravens thing, because it is curious.
While Paul Brown was one of the most renowned shapers of the modern NFL game, he did have a reputation as somewhat of an authoritarian. Nothing wrong with being a strong leader, but he had a ruthless grip on power over his franchises. I do know this affected a lot of people adversely, and while I don't know details about all of that, I do know that Brown infamously and quite foolishly refused to hire Bill Walsh in 1975 to coach the Bengals. Walsh very famously and quite brilliantly went on to elevate the San Francisco 49ers to world-class status, winning three Super Bowls in the process including two over the Cincinnati Bengals.
See, I just don't think all of this happens just because. I'm not God, I can't see everything, and I know 98% of folks just think when you go to Vegas and keep rolling everything but sevens every-single-time it's just the breaks. It's just coincidence. It's just luck.
And the Chiefs have just been unlucky time after time after time.
I don't know. Yeah, maybe -- maybe the ball just bounces around goofy against you way more times than not, maybe. But I don't know -- for you see, here's another peculiar thing about the Brown-to-the-Bengals-Browns-to-the-Ravens thing. It is that the present owner of the woebegone Bengals is none other than Mike Brown, the son of Paul Brown.
Ahh, there's that intergenerational thing going there, and yep, I'm telling you, whenever I've seen the Bengals play in the postseason they've kiiinda had that same deer-in-the-headlights play that is so prevalent among Chiefs players every time they're there. I haven't really seen much at all of anything postseason Bengals, I admit, but I did see enough of that 2015 Wild Card Game to see them thoroughly implode. I do know Carson Palmer in his prime had his knee shredded in another earlier playoff game against Pittsburgh that pretty much ruined their hopes to win (and certainly a lot more beyond that).
Talk to a Bengals fan, I'd venture to say the things they say about postseason stuff wouldn't be much different than what Chiefs fans would say.
Except that another factor is the way they lose. I really don't know a whole lot about those Bengals postseason games, and I do know a lot about the Chiefs ones. In their recent playoff games decided by seven points or fewer, the Chiefs have lost the last seven in a row, often in the most horrific ways imaginable. The average score of those last seven playoff games the Bengals have consecutively lost was 25.1-12.9. I just don't see the reality of much in-game heartbreak there like the Chiefs Kingdom has had to suffer.
And yet another kind of goofy thing -- there are so many! -- of all the teams present in the AFC at the merger in 1970 (meaning excluding the Jaguars, the Texans, and the present version of the Browns) the Chiefs have played every one of them in the playoffs -- and, by the way, lost to every one of them at least once -- except, get this, the Bengals.
One more incidental note before concluding this post with the Chiefs, just another kind of interesting thing. The last Bengals regular season game of this year was against the Ravens -- remember the Ravens (formerly the Browns) have had a number of years of winning at least one playoff game that is over twice as long as the Bengals have had in less than half the time of existence in the league.
So here is the final game, Bengals at Ravens. Bengals are already out of the playoff picture, but the Ravens simply need a home win against the 6-9 Bengals to make the playoffs -- ironically Baltimore's first game the next week would've been against the Chiefs! Baltimore was ahead 27-24 with under a minute left and the Bengals facing 4th down and long at mid-field. They just needed this stop, game over, the Ravens go to the playoffs. The fans were on their feet effusively anticipating a raucous celebration!
Bengals QB Andy Dalton then fires a strike between five Ravens defenders to Tyler Boyd who sprints past them all for the touchdown, stunning Ravens fans everywhere. How delicious was that. Of course right after that the Chiefs were allowed to face a much weaker Titans team in that first playoff game, and the Titans still won.
So we finish here with that Bengals-Chiefs comparison, with the proving the hypothesis. One could say the Bengals have had it worse, winning percentage wise. But the hypothesis is essentially this.
The Chiefs have the most ridiculously abominable record when it comes to being a winning team in the regular season, then suddenly finding ways to inexplicably lose in the postseason.
And by that measure, the Chiefs "win" hands-down.
The Bengals have not had a very good team, ever, in the regular season. Their percentage is .457, ranking mid-pack among teams with losing records for the total franchise (by the way the worst is Tampa Bay at .358). For most of their history they have simply not made the playoffs at all. They've not been terrible, just not consistently very good.
Three times they've gone 12-4 , the best record they've ever had, and twice went to the Super Bowl on that record. Most of their playoff losses have come in the past several years when they have indeed been very good yet done the very familiar Chiefs thing and just tanked in the first postseason game played.
But even those numbers simply don't match up with the number of times the Chiefs have dominated the regular season and then...
Ick.
Fast forward to today, 2018, a new era of Chiefs football starts right now. We do know that things do genuinely look very promising for the Chiefs. Who wants to hear about past disconsolations -- I can understand why you'd have stopped reading this post about 1/20th of the way through, I understand. I'm hearing right now Brett Veach is making moves and shaking things up that reflect a commitment to keep the winning going, and everyone is thoroughly excited about Pat Mahomes taking the reigns and seeing what he can do to not only win regular season games but -- could-it-be -- postseason games. I'm open and willing and eager to see it happen.
And Clark?
Well, there're more thoughts on all of this to come in future posts in this series -- stay tuned!
__
(Episode III)
___
No comments:
Post a Comment