KANSAS CITY, Mo. – The Kansas City Chiefs have won six straight AFC West Division titles, something never before accomplished, and will be hosting a record fourth consecutive conference championship game when the Cincinnati Bengals visit Arrowhead Stadium on Sunday.
The Chiefs have been to the past two Super Bowls. They’ve won a championship. Set so many league-best marks behind the unparalleled play of quarterback Patrick Mahomes and the brilliant coaching of Andy Reid that the rest of the NFL has ample reason to be jealous.
So are the Chiefs following in the footsteps of the New England Patriots as the next football dynasty? Or are they just the latest buzzworthy team that everyone wants to watch?
“I think it was 2008 or 2009 that (Chiefs chairman) Clark Hunt made the statement that we’re going to strive to create an organization that consistently competes for championships,” team president Mark Donovan recalled this week, “and here we are, hosting our fourth straight championship. Never been done before.
“It’s special times to be a Chiefs fan, and special times to be part of this organization. I know Andy says it, and I’ll say it: We’re grateful for this opportunity we’re given.”
Perhaps that’s because they don’t have to look far into their history to remember what it’s like to live at the bottom.
When Hunt made that bold proclamation, the Chiefs were a struggling franchise that hadn’t won a playoff game in more than two decades. And they hadn’t even bottomed out, either. That came a few years later as the team won just two games in the 2012 season.
They soon began the search for a new coach, and in a case of coincidence or fate, the Philadelphia Eagles had just moved on from their own. Hunt quickly flew to Philadelphia and met with Reid, refused to let him out of the room without agreeing to come to Kansas City, and in one weekend changed the course of the organization.
The Chiefs won 11 games in Reid’s first year, one of the great turnarounds in NFL history, and haven’t had another losing season. Their past seven have ended in the playoffs, and with a win over the Bengals on Sunday, they’ll be playing in the final game of the season for a third straight year, having beaten the San Francisco 49ers in 2020 and having lost to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in 2021.
But is nearly a decade of relative dominance enough to call the Chiefs a dynasty? Don’t count on their coach to hazard a guess.
“Listen, I might down the road somewhere,” Reid said of putting the past few years into perspective, “but right now, we’re moving on to Cincinnati. There’s no time to wait. … It’s important that we got on that and make sure our bases are covered.”
That doesn’t mean others can’t – and won’t – opine on the subject. After all, dynasties are purely subjective. The textbook definition, at least from Merriam-Webster, is that they involve “a sports franchise which has a prolonged run of successful seasons,” though in truth that doesn’t define anything concretely.
How successful? And for how long?
Here are some facts: The Chiefs have won six straight home playoff games, one of the 10 longest streaks since the 1970 AFL-NFL merger. They are among seven franchises to reach four straight conference title games, and the first to host all of them. A third straight Super Bowl appearance would match the Miami Dolphins of Don Shula in the early 1970s and the Patriots of Bill Belichick from 2016-18 as the only franchises to make that many in a row with at least one victory.
(Yes, the Buffalo Bills went to four straight Super Bowls. Without winning one, are they worthy of being called a dynasty?)
Of course, there are some NFL dynasties that are difficult to debate.
The Green Bay Packers won six championships under Curly Lambeau from 1929-44. The Chicago Bears of George Halas won four titles in seven seasons during the 1940s. Paul Brown’s teams in Cleveland seemingly never lost in the 1950s. The Vince Lombardi-led Packers of the 1960s won the first two Super Bowls. The 1970s Pittsburgh Steelers with their famed Steel Curtain defense, the 49ers in the 1980s and the Dallas Cowboys of the 1990s paved the way for the Patriots of the past two decades.
Besides longevity and success, most NFL dynasties have something else in common: historic quarterback-coach combinations. Lombardi had Bart Starr. Chuck Noll had Terry Bradshaw in Pittsburgh. Bill Walsh coached Joe Montana and George Seifert had Steve Young in San Francisco. Jimmy Johnson and Barry Switzer relied on Troy Aikman in Dallas. Belichick had Tom Brady.
Kind of like Reid and Mahomes in Kansas City.
Whether the Chiefs are already a dynasty or one in the making is up for debate. But with Reid firmly ensconced in the coach’s office, Mahomes signed for most of the next decade and a plethora of playmakers under long-term contracts – guys such as wide receiver Tyreek Hill, defensive tackle Chris Jones and tight end Travis Kelce – the Chiefs don’t appear to be going away soon.
“As long as we keep the people that we have in this organization on this team with the coach we have, I think we have a chance to be good year in and year out,” said Mahomes, who was drafted 10th overall in 2017 and became the starter the following year, when he was the league’s MVP. “There’s a lot of great football teams in this league, you understand that. But at the same time, you just have to try to get better and be better every year you come in.”