Play It Again Sports Kansas City
The NFL's best playoff storylines involve the Kansas City Chiefs
In 2018, if in that location's ane franchise linked with intriguing plot lines and serious scoring appeal for the masses, it'southward the Kansas Metropolis Chiefs.
With the start of another postseason, the NFL has turned its patented Playoff Storyline Generator upwardly to eleven, scanning the field of Super Bowl hopefuls and exhausting every possible mode to packet and market a deep playoff run from each team.
Some teams, like the Dallas Cowboys, sell themselves; Cowboys games are routinely amidst the most watched in the regular season, even when the team isn't particularly adept. So despite being possibly the most middling, unremarkable squad in the playoffs, Dallas is ever going to exist on the list of teams the NFL would ideally like to run into make a run.
The Kansas City Chiefs, on the other hand, have been a tough sell through more than-or-less their entire existance. Over the last half-decade, in item, they've been somewhere between very adept and keen, merely have never been particularly sexy or exciting. Combine that with a smaller market like M.C. and you don't exactly have the ideal team sitting in the national spotlight.
But in 2018, if there'due south one team overflowing with potential storylines and piece of cake-to-package national appeal, it's the Chiefs. Mayhap for the outset time in their history, they're the squad well-nigh NFL fans would want to run into make it to the Super Bowl out of the AFC.
Their national appeal is obvious; it begins and ends with Patrick Mahomes. Yous could stick the Chiefs in the middle of nowhere in Wyoming, and they'd still be one of the most watched teams with a quarterback similar Mahomes crafting ludicrous magic every calendar week. At that place are countless articles extolling the in one case-in-a-lifetime greatness of Mahomes, so I won't spend any more fourth dimension repeating what you've read and heard on loop for the concluding four months (every bit much as I want to).
Just having Mahomes is enough to propel the Chiefs into permanent national relevancy and brand them appointment television for the next decade or more. But the 2018 flavour has also provided enough of intriguing potential playoff storylines to help farther cement K.C. newfound mass appeal.
On their road to the Super Bowl, the ii AFC teams they'll face off with volition be some combination of the Houston Texans, Baltimore Ravens, Los Angeles Chargers, Indianapolis Colts, and New England Patriots. Whatsoever of these would exist non only quality on-field matchups, simply besides would accept gear up-made storylines for the NFL to play off of to raise the drama, as they so love to do.
With the Texans, information technology'd exist all about the quarterback matchup; Mahomes vs. Deshaun Watson. In the moments betwixt the announcement that the Chiefs had traded up to the tenth spot in the 2017 Draft and the announcement of the choice itself, there was a legitimate fence as to whether Mahomes or Watson was the guy Andy Reid and John Dorsey had invested so much of their hereafter to jump up and get. The Chiefs obviously made the right choice, but Watson has also developed into one of the AFC's better QBs despite much less help in his supporting cast than Mahomes has. Ii QBs from the same typhoon class meeting in the playoffs is always an easy sell.
The Ravens are basically the Anti-Chiefs. They're an elite defense that stays fresh for the entire game thank you to a plodding offense that runs the ball roughly 337 times a game (which they can afford to exercise since they take a kicker who tin hitting a field goal from the parking lot). That doesn't exactly make for exciting football game on its confront. Merely when paired against the Chiefs' quick strike, explosive offense and a run defense that makes one question why G.C.'s opponents ever attempt a unmarried laissez passer, you end upwards with a classic overtime triller in Week 14. The concept of a sequel to that game in a win-or-become-home environment is actually pretty thrilling.
The Los Angeles Chargers would provide a rubber lucifer betwixt segmentation rivals, and give Mahomes the opportunity to end Philip Rivers' concluding all-time chance at getting to the Super Bowl. On the other side, later leading a Week 15 comeback in Arrowhead, Rivers would undoubtedly get some honey leading up to the game to be the one to snuff out G.C.'s young gunslinger'due south first playoff run earlier it fifty-fifty started.
The Colts have to be the squad that, deep downward, all Chiefs fans simultaneously dread and desperately desire seeing in the playoffs. Objectively, at that place'south nothing about the playoff losses to Indy in 1995, 2003, 2006, and 2013 seasons that have any bearing on what would happen in 2019. But the Colts are undeniably one of the darkest clouds above the Chiefs in their playoff history, so seeing them coming into Arrowhead could experience like a bad omen. At the same fourth dimension, it would also feel like the opportunity to finally exorcise a demon that has been festering in Yard.C. for over two decades. It'd besides be fitting symbolism for Mahomes as The I—the QB to right all of the Chiefs' past postseason wrongs.
Then there's New England. Information technology feels inevitable that to get to the Super Bowl, the Chiefs volition have to defeat Pecker Belichick, Tom Brady, and the Patriots. Part of me hesitates to characterize a Chiefs vs. Pats AFC Championship game as a run a risk for Mahomes to put Brady downwards for practiced, simply spiral information technology; a Chiefs vs. Pats AFC Championship game is a chance for Mahomes to put Brady down for expert.
The Patriots have never seemed this vulnerable with Brady at QB. They feel older, slower, and in the early stages of crumbling. That's not fifty-fifty a slight—everything dies. Mahomes and the Chiefs could establish themselves as the new class of the AFC equally the Patriots begin to, at terminal, fade. Though at the aforementioned time, it could exist yet some other moment for Belichick and Brady to evidence yet again that they're however not finished. Either way, information technology makes for keen television.
Which brings united states to the Super Basin. If the Chiefs make it to Atlanta, the bulk of their possible opponents provide some familiarity, potential for interesting dramatic buildup, or both.
The Cowboys are the least fun matchup for the Chiefs, and the only one that but feels entirely dull. That's more often than not because, despite their worldwide popularity, the Cowboys themselves are mostly boring this twelvemonth. Despite their strong defense force, Dak Prescott isn't remotely close to Mahomes in whatsoever form. This would exist a blowout—fun for Chiefs fans, awful for everyone else. Plus, I'd dread the hackneyed, cringeworthy Cowboys vs. Indians window-dressing that'd be plastered all over the buildup to the game.
The Seahawks would be a fun matchup on the field, but their win over the Chiefs in Week 16 isn't indicative of these teams facing off at total force on both sides. The Chiefs were almost certainly not in must-win fashion confronting the Seahawks a couple weeks agone, and then a rematch with both teams in do-or-die mode would likely have a different event. The existent cadre of the Seahawks and Chiefs beingness a decent interconference rivalry is their fanbases competing over who is the loudest. On a neutral playing field, yous lose that aspect entirely. The Super Bowl is big no affair who is in it, but the Seahawks aren't the best matchup for the Chiefs.
The Eagles, on paper, would exist an ideal matchup. Doug Pederson, having already won a Super Bowl, coming together his mentor Andy Reid as he searches for his first would exist a great story. But the Eagles are depleted by injury, and the odds that Nick Foles can drag this team to another championship are pretty slim. This would be a much more enjoyable matchup if Philly looked more like the 2017 version of themselves, but as information technology stands now it's still 1 that would create some extra fizz.
New Orleans is the best matchup from a pure football perspective. Mahomes and Drew Brees are the favorites to win MVP, so it'd exist an opportunity for whichever QB didn't win the honor to prove to the other who the real MVP is. Outside of that, in that location isn't a lot of intrigue here, merely the game itself would no doubt be a classic; a back-and-forth boxing between a futurity Hall of Famer and the league's newest superstar. Both offenses are prolific, and while the Saints defense has been solid it's never had to concur upwards confronting an criminal offence similar K.C.'s. It'd exist loftier scoring, and information technology'd be a lot of fun.
Chicago would exist an amazing buildup. Y'all've got Andy Reid going upwardly against his latest protege to turn a franchise effectually in Matt Nagy. The offensive schemes are very like (more similar, in fact, than Pederson's is to Reid'due south). You lot've got the i QB, Mitchell Trubisky, who was taken before Mahomes. And then you'd have Mahomes with a chance to prove to the world what everyone already knows, and Trubisky with a chip on his shoulder, wanting to prove to the world that the Bears didn't make a mistake taking him over Mahomes. The event on the field would probable exist a bit of fun, but nowhere most as exciting as the buildup would hope. The Bears are good, and they're primed to continue to develop and become a force in the NFC, merely they practise still feel like they're a year away from being a real threat in the playoffs
Finally, of course, nosotros have the Rams. What other matchup practise people want to run across, really? How can you not pull for a rematch of a game in which 100 points were scored during the regular flavour? The league would be able to accept their cake and eat it as well, with i of their 50.A. franchises making it to the Super Bowl without losing out on the league'due south most exciting young player existence there as well. And they'd go a sequel to 1 of the near exhilarating games ever played. I'd say the game could never live up to the hype, merely I also said that before Week eleven. If there always was a matchup that fit the pyrotechnic pageantry that the NFL has molded the Super Bowl into, it's the Los Angeles Rams vs. the Kansas Urban center Chiefs.
Existence the darlings of the NFL is uncharted waters for the Chiefs and their fans. Mahomes has singlehandedly plucked an entire organization from an endless loop of milquetoast seasons and thrust them into the limelight every bit the league's must-encounter team. It's been said over and over about this team, only this year feels different. Super Basin or non, this postseason will be special.
Source: https://arrowheadaddict.com/2019/01/03/best-nfl-playoff-storylines-kansas-city-chiefs-patrick-mahomes/
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