The reality of the 15th week of the National Football League season was terribly unkind to the Chiefs, but the headlines were unmistakably brutal.
The New York Post proclaimed: “The Chiefs dynasty is over.”
Heavy Sports declared: “Chargers end Chiefs dynasty.”
ESPN.com asked: “Is their Super Bowl window closing?”
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Maybe, when it comes to certain subjects, it helps to have been around a while. Like history. Obviously, I didn’t live through the American Revolution and World War II, but I know they happened. I did live through the Patriots dynasty, and I know they weren’t felled by one tough season or one very significant injury to their most essential player.
Perhaps those who wrote those words are just so tired of the Chiefs -- exhausted by the luxury-box TV shots of Taylor Swift, the conspiracy theories about game officials’ love for KC, the team’s persistent presence on the Super Bowl stage or some of the awful things their kicker has said in public – they are trying to speak the team’s demise into existence. If that worked in real life, though, you think the Patriots would have advanced beyond their third Super Bowl title?
The Chiefs’ loss Sunday to the Chargers officially dropped them from contention for the NFL Playoffs, but it was obvious this was the destination their season would reach from the time they lost a Thanksgiving game at Dallas. There still were inviting games against Tennessee and Las Vegas remaining, but just too much traffic for a.500 team to navigate on the way.
This offseason will be enormous for the Chiefs, and it honestly starts as soon as Patrick Mahomes consents to the surgery to repair what we’ve been told is a torn anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee. Getting right for the future, though, is even more important than getting set for 2026. Mahomes will turn 31 in September. He already has played in five Super Bowls and won three. With the way quarterbacks are aging in today’s game (or aren’t), he could produce as many as eight high-level seasons before hitting 39.
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There are elements of the team that need to be improved, that have been allowed to decline even as the team succeeded through the early part of this decade. They haven’t had an elite wide receiver for Mahomes since trading away Tyreek Hill in early 2022, putting enormous pressure on superstar tight end Travis Kelce, now 36, to carry the passing attack. He’s headed to the Hall of Fame, but his arrival date seems ever more likely to come soon. The defense has been solid, but hardly disruptive or opportunistic. The Chiefs rank 29th in turnovers forced, only 11 in 14 games. They need to identify playmakers in free agency or the draft.
As they showed a year ago, however, with many of those same limitations in place, any team with a healthy Mahomes at quarterback remains a serious threat. It is not perceptibly different from when Tom Brady was quarterbacking the Patriots.
After he took command of the starting job from Drew Bledsoe because of a significant injury, Brady led the Pats to Super Bowl victories in 2001, 2003 and 2004. And then he didn’t win another for more than a decade. Does that mean the Patriots’ dynasty was over before the middle of this century’s first decade?
They made it to the Super Bowl with a perfect record in 2007 but fell to the Giants and David Tyree’s helmet catch. They made it again in 2011. They lost again to Eli Manning and the Giants.
In between, Brady missed nearly the entire 2008 season with an ACL tear and the Steelers, Colts, Saints and Packers all won Super Bowls. The Pats were not finished, though, winning again in 2014, 2016 and 2018, getting plenty help from the Seahawks (blown play call on 2-and-goal from the 1) and Falcons (somehow blew a 28-3 lead).
The Chiefs dynasty was launched, in reality, with a loss to the Patriots in the 2018 AFC Championship game. It is not common for a defeat to be the start of a team’s reign, but we all know what we saw that evening, and we all know if not for the league’s antiquated overtime rules – which since have been addressed – it might have been KC in that season’s Super Bowl.
That was the start of six consecutive trips to the AFC title game. KC was back a year later and got past that stage to the “Big Game” this time, then defeated the 49ers for their first Lombardi Trophy in 50 years. In all, they were in four of the next five Super Bowls, winning three times. They had an opportunity to become only the second team to win four in a six-year period.
This may be a dynasty on pause, pending the outcome of Mahomes’ likely surgery, the attention to some personnel needs and the future plans of coach Andy Reid, who will turn 68 during the offseason.
Look, debating whether this is it for KC is the sort of thing that ought to be discussed on radio and TV sports talk programs. Those who argue that it is do not have history on their side, but no one can see the future. And proclaiming the end of a dynasty is the sort of headline that is going to attract attention in a media world where that is very much the literal currency.
As no one making such a statement can be proven wrong for months, or years, or even a decade in the Patriots’ case, it can feel safe to write those words. When Patrick Mahomes is on the other side, though, there is danger.