A Chiefs party 50 years coming: ‘Like a fantasy, and it all came true.’
The bass bumps from wall to wall, locker to locker, grown men in the wake of the moment of their lives dancing and screaming and cursing and crying. They trade turns with the ultimate prize in American sports. Is this real? It feels real. Sounds real. Looks real. It’s probably real?
This party is 50 years in the making, through generations of losing broken up by playoff heartbreak, a cable subscription the only way the Chiefs and their fans could see a celebration like this.
The Chiefs are all different now, forever, decades of playoff failure pushed to the past tense after a 31-20 win over the 49ers in Super Bowl LIV on Sunday with (of course) the second-biggest comeback in the history of America’s biggest game.
The Chiefs: NFL champions. The parade is Wednesday. It really happened. It’s really happening. Dangit if it doesn’t feel like it’s going to keep happening.
“We’re married for life now, baby,” tight end Travis Kelce said. “We all have the same ring.”
The moment gives Kelce a chance to update the chorus from the Beastie Boys song he’s been screaming to anyone who would listen:
“You gotta fight!” he screamed in that locker room.
“For your right!” and then came a brief pause.
“To Lom-BAAAARRRRRRDDDDIIIIII!”
This Chiefs team changed their franchise’s history and that of their adopted hometown for a thousand reasons, and in a million ways, some of which can be shorthanded — trust in each other, belief in the broader mission, Patrick Mahomes.
They won their sport’s ultimate prize in specific ways that will be remembered as long as any of us are alive — overcoming all the injuries (including the time Mahomes’ kneecap slid to the side of his leg), hearing that Ryan Fitzpatrick beat Tom Brady to give them a first-round bye, then hearing that Ryan Tannehill beat Lamar Jackson to give them a home game, falling behind 24 points in the Divisional Round, then 10 in the AFC Championship Game, then 10 again in the Super Bowl to win in the playoffs.
No quarterback had ever won three times after trailing by 10 or more in one postseason. Of course Mahomes became the first.
This is an absurd thing to say but it’s also true: Mahomes won Super Bowl MVP in one of the three or so worst games of his brilliant career. He is 24 years old, the youngest player in league history to win both league MVP (last year) and a Super Bowl. It is not out of line to start wondering if we’re watching the best to ever do it, from the beginning of his career to the end, all in Kansas City.
“He bulletproof, man,” safety Tyrann Mathieu said. “Kansas City’s blessed. Andy Reid is blessed. Shoot, we’re all blessed to have Patrick Mahomes.
There has never been a path quite like this, which is how it should be, because there has never been a team quite like this. They follow their unicorn quarterback, who in turn talks almost exclusively of those around him, together helping Reid win his first Super Bowl championship in 21 years.
No man ever coached so long to win for the first time. No man ever had so many people around the league rooting for him, either.
“He’s one of the best coaches of all time,” Mahomes said. “He already was before we won this game, but we wanted to get that trophy just because he deserved it.”
You heard that everywhere in the locker room. Brett Veach, who started with Reid out of college as an intern in Philadelphia and is now the Chiefs’ general manager, said that everyone wanted to win for Reid but the heck of it was that Reid wanted to win for everyone else.
When it finally happened, and the confetti fell down and the Gatorade splashed Reid’s back, Veach squeezed his first boss for a hug. Veach told Reid he loved him. Reid did the same. They smiled, they laughed. The moment that each of them had envisioned for so long, and watched so many other teams enjoy, finally theirs.
“We just always believed there was something special about this group,” Veach said. “Sometimes people are looking out for you.”
The best moment of their professional lives was made by dozens of smaller moments, going back for years in some ways, but going back to the opening kickoff on this night.
The Chiefs gave up 17 consecutive points, with 49ers coach Kyle Shanahan carving their defense with play action calls and misdirection runs. On the other side, the Chiefs had nothing. The interior of the line was being mauled, and Mahomes was playing one of the worst games of his career.
The 49ers led by 10 into the fourth quarter, and Mahomes had two interceptions for the first time in more than a year. Around that time, Mathieu looked at his head coach.
“He was like, ‘Yo, you got this?’” Mathieu said. “I’m like, ‘Coach, I promise you! We got this!’”
They did, and the details read like a replay of comebacks from before but are no less spectacular for the regularity — a stop by coordinator Steve Spagnuolo’s remade defense, a ridiculous backfoot 55-yards-in-the-air heave to Tyreek Hill on third-and-15, a touchdown to Kelce, another stop, and then another touchdown (on a pass thrown over former teammate Dee Ford) that Mahomes celebrated 76 yards down the field toward the other end.
“Indescribable,” receiver Mecole Hardman said.
“We just had to buck up on defense, get some stops, then let Pat Mahomes take care of the rest,” cornerback Charvarius Ward said.
“I remember seeing the ball go in the air,” center Austin Reiter said of the pass to Hill. “I remember thinking: ‘Thank god.’ And: ‘About damn time.’”
The locker room rocked, with guys who are now connected forever taking turns posing with the trophy. Veach’s voice had long been faded, an orange Gatorade cup he grabbed to help proving to be of little use. An offensive lineman dropped trou for the shower, but covered the important parts when he turned around. It was among the few displays of humility you could find.
These men know where their franchise has been. They have heard people say their coach will never win the big game, and that they are a bunch of paper lions propped up by their quarterback.
They know that back home a city was already partying like never before, a watch party at the Power & Light District rocking so hard that people were turned away hours before kickoff.
Football is a business, but in the best moments it’s also personal, which is why Anthony Hitchens was talking about wanting to celebrate in Kansas City rather than Miami and Kelce was invoking Hank Stram by talking about “matriculating the ball downfield” and Mathieu was saying his teammates made him look good.
Off in a back corner, a league staffer was trying to one last question an interview with Chris Jones and bless his heart because Jones kept asking for more questions. He had been through so damn much, sliding out of the first round four years ago because of questions about his consistency and spending the time since showing nothing but consistency. You’re damn right he wanted to talk about it.
Jones wanted a new contract last summer, and he’d earned it, but football is a business and the Chiefs didn’t have to give him one. That figures to change now, one way or the other, but if you wonder where his heart is you should hear his words as his teammates danced around him.
“We’re going to build a (bleeping) dynasty in Kansas City, man,” he said at one point.
“Couldn’t nobody handle us last year and we just needed a defense that could stop a play every now and then and guess what? We prevailed,” he continued.
“Man, listen,” he went on, by now the staffer to the side visibly frustrated. “This ain’t no one-hit wonder here. This is (bleeping) sack nation.”
That idea of this party continuing, not just this week but for years, has been talked about already. Told what Jones said, Kelce started singing. Literally, singing.
“It’s only just begun!” he sang, and we think maybe he was going for the Carpenters’ song?
Either way, he continued: “You already know. It feels like we’re doing this every year from here on out.”
In another corner of the party, Mathieu talked about a dinner he had with Veach and Mahomes in downtown Kansas City shortly after signing as a free agent last March. The meal was less congratulatory and more of a challenge. The prize wasn’t the contract, and the contract wasn’t the prize. This relationship was about more.
Veach told Mathieu his charge now was to force the team to pay him again in two years. Mahomes added that this should be the beginning of a three-year run, maybe five, maybe longer. It’s funny where the mind goes sometimes, right?
Mathieu laughed at that memory.
“I’m like, ‘OK, cool,’” he said. “Back then, this was like a fantasy, and it all came true.”
This story was originally published February 3, 2020 at 12:33 AM.