No ecstasy without the agony: Chiefs finally make joyous journey back to Super Bowl
As if they were meant to go together, the Chiefs and the Super Bowl shared the stage and the spotlight from its inception in 1967 and twice in the first four. And that was no mere happenstance.
The game that has morphed into a national obsession may never have taken shape if not for Lamar Hunt, the man instrumental in forming the old AFL and forging the merger and who alertly moved the Dallas Texans to Kansas City in 1963 and had the wisdom to hire the innovative Hank Stram as his coach.
Heck, the event’s underpinnings are so entwined with Hunt’s contributions to the sport that its very name was derived from an apparently playful notion that came to mind from watching his children playing with the ol’ Wham-O “Super Ball.”
Back then, especially after the Chiefs smothered the Minnesota Vikings 23-7 in Super Bowl IV 50 years ago, the Chiefs appeared destined to keep contending for years and make routine returns to the pinnacle.
But that foundation proved to be a cruel mirage. It gave way to nearly a half-century of ultimate futility distinguished by bizarre endings and perhaps all the more galling because the Chiefs never had been able to reel in the AFC Championship trophy renamed in Hunt’s honor in 1984.
Excruciating as the intervening span has been, though, that agonizing journey is what made Sunday one of the most exhilarating and enchanting days this city has ever known:
In Sunday’s AFC Championship Game at Arrowhead Stadium, the Chiefs beat Tennessee to both give a nod to a bygone era and usher in a new one with their long-awaited Super Bowl berth.
Much like you can’t know light without the darkness, the ecstasy without the agony, there is a certain joy you can only know after trudging through a void for an eternity … and at last emerging into a promised land whose very existence had become downright suspect.
See, for instance, what it meant to Kansas City when the 2014-2015 Royals played in the World Series after not so much as making the postseason since 1985.
Then consider that the Royals, in fact, have gone to the World Series four times since the last time the Chiefs played in the Super Bowl.
Which is just one way to frame in context the 18,000-plus days since the Chiefs last played in one.
In between, we’ve seen Watergate and two U.S. presidents impeached and another who resigned and the fall of the Berlin Wall and Sept. 11 and the advent of the ATM and DNA testing and a rise of the machines from cell phones to the Internet and … you get the idea.
In between, more locally, we’ve seen one airport finished and another on the way … and the birth of Arrowhead and Kauffman stadiums ... and the coming and going of the NHL’s Kansas City Scouts and NBA’s Kansas City Kings … and the departure of the NCAA … and the revival of downtown with the Power & Light District and the Sprint Center campaigned for on the premise of an anchor tenant that has yet to be delivered.
And more specifically to the Chiefs themselves, owner Clark Hunt was 4 years old the last time around, when that training camp began in the moonshadow of the 1969 Apollo 11 mission.
Pat Mahomes Sr. would be born later in 1970, just before the debut of the newfangled concept of Monday Night Football — which in December 1971 would be graced by the presence of a well-developed 13-year-old Andy Reid in a Rams uniform for a Punt, Pass and Kick competition.
Twelve days after Reid’s appearance, on Christmas Day 1971, came the symbolic (if not causal) dividing line in franchise history: the 27-24 double overtime loss to Miami in an AFC Divisional playoff game.
The longest game in NFL history (82 minutes 40 seconds) was the last at Municipal Stadium. And the longest game had long-lasting ripples, coincidental or not, that started a streak of misery.
After winning three AFL titles and a Super Bowl and five of the first seven playoff games in franchise history between 1962 and 1970, the Chiefs wouldn’t return to the postseason for 15 years after the Dolphins loss. They were 3-12 in playoff games since Super Bowl IV when Andy Reid arrived after the 2012 season as the 12th coach since Stram was ousted in 1975.
Even as a parade of Chiefs from the glory days was being enshrined in the Pro Football Hall of Fame, those desolate years were marked by momentary buildups only to fizzle out with a multitude of slapstick playoff losses.
And the franchise was in turmoil, if not downright chaos, when Reid was hired.
His arrival brought instant change and stability. Inheriting a team that had gone 2-14, Reid led them to a 9-0 start. Next thing you know, the Chiefs are leading the Colts 38-10 in Indianapolis on Jan. 4, 2014, with a chance to win the organization’s first playoff game in 20 years.
And then that crumbled into a 45-44 loss, marked by Andrew Luck fumbling to himself to score a touchdown. The same sort of absurdity you’d see in 2018 against the Titans, when the Chiefs bungled a 21-3 lead in a game distinguished by Marcus Mariota … throwing a touchdown to himself.
But something else was happening here with the arrival of a revolutionary, generational, transformational force in Patrick Mahomes, who late in the 2017 season became the 30th quarterback to start a game for the Chiefs since Len Dawson guided them in Super Bowl IV.
In throwing for 50 touchdown passes and 5,097 yards and being named NFL Most Valuable Player in his first full season as a starter, Mahomes was a living, breathing reminder of both how sometimes one person can change everything you think and believe.
So, yes, it stung when the Chiefs lost to the Patriots in the AFC Championship Game a year ago with the sort of flukiness to which we’ve become accustomed: Dee Ford lined up offside to negate a seemingly game-sealing interception by Charvarius Ward; a coin toss that went the Patriots way and set them up to expose the Chiefs’ Achilles heel once and for all in the 37-31 overtime loss.
But anyone watching the Chiefs knew something had changed forever, that anything was possible with Mahomes if the Chiefs could give him the proper support system. And that they did in the offseason, when they fired offensive coordinator Bob Sutton and replaced him with Steve Spagnuolo and brought in a new scheme and the pivotal likes of Tyrann Mathieu and Frank Clark.
Because of all that, the window to the Super Bowl seemingly would have been open for the next few years regardless of what happened on Sunday.
But there’s also no time like the present.
Especially for a fan base that had suffered in so many ways for 50 damned years.
Now it no longer has to wonder if it’s cursed or jinxed but just how this breakthrough might make for more ahead — starting with getting reacquainted with the Super Bowl it once knew so well.
This story was originally published January 19, 2020 at 5:08 PM.