Chiefs Playoff Preview, Part IV

Did you happen to see that the Chiefs 565 total points scored this season was the third best in NFL history? Only the '07 Patriots and '13 Broncos had more. The '07 Patriots only went 16-0 in the regular season and did get all the way to the Super Bowl. The '13 Broncos were led by Peyton Manning whose 55 TD passes is the only mark higher than this year's Patrick Mahomes, who had 50. Annnd... they also went to the Super Bowl that year.

So, um, yeah.

Will this Chiefs team at least make it to the Super Bowl?

For you see, the Chiefs Kingdom is starving for at least that two week period when we're one of the two most celebrated teams in the pro football world. Sure I'd like to win the thing, but hey, for two weeks, at least our team gets its share of the fame and glory in the pro football world.

The Chiefs have never had that.

Oh sure they were in two of the first four Super Bowls. But back then it wasn't the extravaganza it is now. And for that 4th Super Bowl, all everyone talked about was how much the Vikings were going to roll over us and how much of a slimeball that gambling rogue Len Dawson must be. Errgh.

Otherwise, since that January day in 1970, the Chiefs have never been one of those showcased teams, even though -- as we noted last Friday they now have more overall regular season wins than the Raiders do -- the Chiefs have been a pretty good team... some years they have been extraordinarily good...

And then there was that first playoff game.

Yes I sooo much want to revel in Super Bowl title glory, don't get me wrong, but really, with what we've been through, wouldn't you just be happy with at least one solid hard-fought exciting thrilling playoff win? At least one? You know the kind, the kind where it is close and tough but where our fine Chiefs team shows the full amount of got-it to richly earn that dubya. The last time we had a playoff win by a final margin of seven points or fewer was that Joe Montana-to-Tim Barnett TD pass in-the-back-of-the-end-zone game against Pittsburgh in January of 1994 -- Patrick Mahomes was over a year away from being born.

There's also this. The Chiefs have the No. 1 seed which means all we have to do is win one single playoff game to get to the conference championship game in Kansas City. Do you know that the Chiefs have never hosted a conference championship game? Yeah, huh -- never. Yes you read that right, never ever has there been an AFL or AFC conference championship game in Kansas City, not just at Arrowhead, but at Metropolitan Stadium or anywhere in Kansas City at all. Back on January 1st of 1967 we played at Buffalo, winning there to go on to Super Bowl I. To get to Super Bowl IV we played in Oakland. We played the Bills in Buffalo after beating Pittsburgh then Houston in January 1994.

We certainly had good enough teams in '71, '90, '94, '95, '97, '03, '13, '15, '16, and '17 to make it at least to the conference championship game but... you know.

Here's the other thing -- I went ahead and checked as I tend to do, just to see: there are only three other teams in the NFL right now who have never hosted a conference championship game. Tennessee-once-Houston never has, though they've played in a few on the road. The current Houston team, the Texans, has not hosted a conference championship game, but they've only been around since 2002. Baltimore has also played in a few but they've all been on the road, and they've only been around since 1996 (considering they gave up their Browns history to the current Browns). I should add that Detroit hosted three NFL championship games but none since 1957.

This means that while Kansas City has never ever, never ever hosted a conference championship game, believe it or not, notoriously unsuccessful teams like Arizona, Carolina, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Jacksonville, New Orleans, and Tampa Bay have all hosted at least one conference championship game in their histories. Several of them quite recently even!

Just -- not -- the -- Chiefs.

Yeah, it's all a bit excruciating. As it is I've just got to keep my expectations to just about zero. I know we have a phenomenally good team, and I so very much want to write about it here. But as I've posted here a number of times in this preview series, I've done it so often before each of the many past Chiefs postseason appearances ("Wow lookit how great we really are we have to win this time!!!") and it has eventually meant so little that I just don't want to bother any more.

I mean, let's do this, let's look at probably our weakest area, defending the run, and the poor play of our linebackers Reggie Ragland and Anthony Hitchens. Thing is, both of those guys are still very talented and very athletic. This season we all know they've too often missed their marks or taken poor angles or simply not finished. I got that.

But why is it during your typical playoff game, that kind of thing just continues to be rotten for the Chiefs while our legitimate strengths just dissipate? Why is the opposite for the opponent, just about every single time the Chiefs step on the field for a playoff game?! Why can't it be the case where a Ragland and a Hitchens rises up to be as good as they're supposed to be, and our other already exceptional players continue to stay exceptional?

Yes, yes yes yes, it should happen for once, for once after so many heartbreaks, that our team should play like our team's played all year long and we win a playoff game.

Right now, I am just reveling in our accomplishments for the year. All the Mahomes and Company achievements. All the accolades that come with a No. 1 seed. All the good feeling about knowing we've deftly arranged the injury management and playing time of key players so they'll be fully healthy for January 12 -- think Eric Berry and Sammy Watkins just to name a couple. And trust me, I am excited about our playoff game at Arrowhead in two weeks, I am.

In the meantime, I have to put up yet another pic of the empty seats right in the middle of a game between the gargantuan market Giants and mega-media darling Cowboys, and the game was a close one! New York fans refused to show up in droves again, again to me more evidence that the NFL will somehow, someway take care of business to rectify that because of the competitive duplicity: We just can't have New York fans abandoning this game, there are too many of them with money they're not spending on us.

Meanwhile, the Chiefs are selling out and the Kingdom is comprised of some of the most devoted fans in the NFL.

Here's another ding-dong thing about the NFL that I've just realized: Where are they on this bowl game abandonment by the best college football players this year? Some future-NFL collegiate football players are skipping their bowl games to supposedly take more time to better prepare for the NFL draft.

Excuse me?

In fact Ohio State's Nick Bosa -- I believe considered a top NFL draft pick -- skipped the entire season when, after recovering from a minor injury, just decided not to play for his team any more. Too many have given up on their teams, foolishly reneging on their commitments to their schools, their teammates, and their responsibilities. Yes, that's right, I happen to think responsibility should still carry a great deal of weight, and ditching the school that has committed itself to you before your end of the deal is up is a brazen abrogation of your responsibility. The bowl games themselves generate a lot of money for the players to get the education they signed up for to begin with, as well as for millions of other students.

The school's themselves should be penalizing these players somehow, yet I understand the players may just say "F--- you I'm going off to make a million dollars now." So then what? Short of enough principled people in our society getting off their asses and expecting more from people by vocally refusing to tolerate this, what about the NFL taking a stand?

How about telling collegiate players if they don't fulfill their commitment, which does include suiting up for your bowl game, then you are ineligible for being drafted by an NFL team for a full year after you leave your school. How about that? How about making a stand for righteous things like this?

Ahh, I know. Roger Goodell is still commissioner, I see. Huh.

What does this have to do with the Chiefs?

Seems to me everyone was pretty great with Patrick Mahomes going to the mat with bold leadership gravitas after the Kareem Hunt mess and remarking, "We don't do that kind of thing here." Seems to me that kind of took in the Kingdom, around the football world, and even beyond by those who do genuinely respect that people should genuinely respect people in certain ways. Seems to me that kind of happened.

Sure I believe the Chiefs are committed to making principled stands about these kinds of things, that's a truly awesome thing about our team. Why am I mentioning it here though? Why do I so cynically believe this bowl game idiocy will come back to hurt the Chiefs somehow -- much because it is a thing we allow to happen that hurts our society? Already I'd read a commentary by a sports pundit who shared something very insightful: What's going to keep a collegiate player who now disses his college from dissing his NFL team at some point in the future?

As it is, we're where we are now, and it is very much a very good place to be. 20 teams are missing the postseason this year, we're not one of them. 30 teams are not the No. 1 seed in the conference, we're not one of them. 31 teams don't have Patrick Mahomes and his cohort of playmakers, so right now, this is fun. The regular season has been a blast, and at least for the next two weeks we get to really enjoy where we're at.

And if you didn't notice, today is the one-year anniversary of that marvelous day when Patrick Mahomes went into Denver and showed us all what he could do. It was a glorious day, I remember it very fondly. This year has been a very nice extension of that.

And again, please, I'm fully on board with this:

Here's to it going way past January 12.
__