The end of the Kansas City Chiefs’ seven-year dynasty has everyone involved with the franchise in their feelings. Even their former players.
The Chiefs had famously been to seven straight AFC Championships during Patrick Mahomes’ first seven years as a starting QB from 2018-2024. But at 6-8 and with Mahomes now lost to an ACL tear, the first major injury of his career, the Chiefs are drifting off from their dynasty with no new direction.
Mahomes and the Chiefs will not make the 2025 playoffs. The king is dead, long live the king.
It really is the end of an era. And that will affect most fans and teams in a very positive way, as they now have a better shot at glory. But for the Chiefs, it’s a sad time. So sad that even former players like Tyrann Mathieu, who they released without a care, are reopening old wounds.
In a recent interview with Ari Meirov, Mathieu, a three-time First-Team All-Pro who retired from the NFL back in July, talked about the anger he felt when he was released by the Chiefs rather callously.
"That really bothered me. It stuck on me for over a year. When I first signed with the Saints, I missed the first 7–8 days of camp. That was me looking in the mirror saying, 'What is going on? What did i do wrong?'" Mathieu remembered. "I couldn’t understand it.... I never thought I would leave Kansas City. It took me a while to get over that, actually."
Mathieu, nicknamed the Honey Badger while at LSU, had signed with the Chiefs in 2019. That year, he was named a First-Team All-Pro, and the Chiefs won the Super Bowl. The next year Mathieu was First-Team All-Pro again as well as a Pro Bowler, but the Chiefs lost the Super Bowl. In 2021, Mathieu made the Pro Bowl again, and the Chiefs lost in the AFC Championship.
After that, the Chiefs didn’t even offer the veteran a new contract. Instead, he was forced to play out his final three years in the league with the lowly New Orleans Saints from 2022-2024.
And while New Orleans was Mathieu’s hometown team, you can tell there’s still some hard feelings about the breakup from Mathieu’s perspective. Especially considering he missed out on two more titles.
Chiefs fans are dealign with their first true taste of failure in nearly a decade and the first inkling that Patrick Mahomes might be past his prime. It will be a real gut punch to hear a former fan favorite talk about how poorly he was treated by their team as he was headed out the door.
When it rains, it pours, eh Kansas City?