Some people are fans of the Kansas City Chiefs. But many, many more people are NOT fans of the Kansas City Chiefs. This 2021 Defector NFL team preview is for those in the latter group. Read all the previews so far here.
Your team: Kansas City Chiefs.
Your 2020 record: 14-2, with the stage perfectly set for this team to repeat and cement an ongoing dynasty of their own. They got the 1-seed. Their only meaningful loss during the regular season was against Vegas (in a game that would prove eerily prophetic when they blew a 21-10 lead, gave 144 yards given up on the ground, and gifted the Raiders three sacks). They plucked Le’Veon Bell off the dole just for kicks. They had a requisite effortless comeback win in the AFC title game. They went into the Super Bowl against Tampa as the betting favorite and were primed for their quarterback to usurp Tom Brady as top dog of the NFL for good.
And then they got absolutely fucking smoked.
The Chiefs were in this game right up to the end of the first half, when a bullshit PI call on their corner handed Brady an easy touchdown. And even after that, I was like This isn’t a big deal. I’ve seen the Chiefs come back from bigger deficits. They’ll get their shit together in the second half.
They didn’t. You absolute pieces of SHIT. I was ready to be free of Tom Brady forever. But nooooooo. No, you guys just had to drop every pass and block like you had a train to catch. You just had to let your All-Universe QB get pressured on 29 dropbacks, a Super Bowl record. You just had to let Leonard Fournette’s unvaccinated ass run all over you. Your coach’s kid just HAD to be sucking down pills and booze while helping to put together the game plan. And you just had to let this smug sack of shit get a seventh ring that no one on Earth wanted him to get.
You know how the Seahawks’ failure to defend their title (also in a game against Tom Brady) obliterated ALL of the happy feelings they generated during their original Super Bowl run? That just happened to you. I thought the Bucs were lucky to be winning at halftime of that game. By the end of it, I thought their opponents were lucky to simply still be alive. Fucking pathetic. Remind me never to believe in the Chiefs again. Getting stunted on by the Florida variant of Tom Brady is a mortal sin.
Your coach: Andy Reid, whose son permanently incapacitated a 5-year-old girl in a car crash on the eve of the Super Bowl. Assistant coach Britt Reid was driving nearly 84 mph when he hit that girl. He was also apparently shitfaced and on more Adderall than a junior at Oberlin. Did ANYONE point the finger at Reid’s asshole kid for the lives he destroyed? Not in this town, they didn’t.
Do they have a Guy on the coaching staff? Eric Bienieimy is too famous as a coach to be a Guy anymore. But you know who isn’t? Former Bear Andy Heck and former Eagle Greg Lewis! Remember those Guys? Andy Heck is super thumby now!
When your neck is as thick as your head, that’s when you KNOW you’re in coachin’ biz.
Your quarterback: Patrick Mahomes, who’s not so imposing when he’s playing behind a row of cardboard cutout Chiefs fans. Your backup is still the immortal Chad Henne, who scrambled his way to glory against Cleveland in the divisional round and will never make an important play ever again.
What’s new that sucks: After letting the Bucs tie Mahomes to a goal post and fire paintballs at him, the Chiefs were like, “Hmmm, maybe we should do something about our line.” So they ditched both starting tackles, traded for tackle Orlando Brown Jr., welcomed Dr. Laurent Duvernay-Tardif back from COVID leave, and signed guard Joe Thuney away from the Pats for over $46 million guaranteed. If Nate Solder is any indication (and he is), former Patriots linemen fare just about as well for other teams as former Patriots assistants do. The Chiefs also signed famous Twitter person Kyle Long out of retirement to play guard, but he got hurt.
Meanwhile, Frank Clark was arrested for felony firearm possession. Twice. THIS GUY REALLY LOVES TO BE ARRESTED. Almost as much as Missourians love getting COVID! Frank just driving from state to state with a trunk full of guns, getting a rock-hard dick and crying out ARREST ME DADDY the second he gets caught. You can get away with harboring the likes of Frank Clark and Tyreek Hill when you’re the Chiefs and whizzing the ball all over the stadium to win championships. But you CAN’T get away with that shit when you get to the Super Bowl and then lay down like fucking Lord Cornwallis did. When you let Tampa Bay—TAMPA BAY!—hog all that glory, people suddenly remember that your team is a boarding house for unrepentant shitbags. HONEYMOON’S OVER FOR YOU, FUCKNUTS.
Elsewhere, Mecole Hardman is now your No. 2 wideout, which is bad news because Mecole Hardman is only exciting when he’s a fifth-stringer. One of our preeminent small-dose receivers. Running back Jerick McKinnon is here to get horribly injured before even playing a snap, leaving all of the backfield grunt work to Clyde Edwards-EEEEEEEElaire. Le’Veon Bell is no longer here after sucking and then throwing a shitfit on his way out the door. I hate it when the Steelers are proven right.
Speaking of the Steelers, Travis Kelce shaved his beard and now looks like Ben Roethlisberger.
GAHHHHHHHHHHHH SHOOT HIM! SHOOT HIM DEAD!
What has always sucked: There’s nothing worse than a person with money not using it well. So let’s say hello to the Hunt family, shall we?
The Chiefs ownership is now deep into its third and fourth generations of inherited wealth. Failsons of failsons of failsons of bootleggers. This is when things start to get REALLY British: producing people who can only get divorced, file lawsuits against one another, and rush to the cosmetic dentist to have their oral stalactites rearranged into something more presentable.
These people are all descendants of oil tycoon H.L. Hunt. Hunt, seen here auditioning for the role of Larry “Bud” Melman before Calvert DeForest was hired for it, was quite the character back in day. And by that I mean that he was a demented old fucker:
In September, 1972, Rena Pederson of The Dallas Morning News went to the Hunt home to interview him at breakfast. Hunt sat munching grapes, pecans, dates, and apricots. He also had before him an array of fruit juices and bouillon. All of a sudden, he dropped to the floor on all fours and began crawling about. “I’m a crank about creeping!” he cried, rounding the antique dining table on his hands and knees.
You can just picture the urine jars he kept on his windowsill, can’t you? Ah but it gets better. Old Man Hunt also believed he would live to be over 167 years old (he would end up falling short by 82 years), worshipped both Joe McCarthy and George Wallace, wanted to deport all black Americans back to Africa, donated generously to the John Birch Society, and may have been implicated in the Kennedy assassination. This guy didn't miss when aiming for the wrong side of history, and the football team that sprung from his ashes serves as lipstick for a great many pigs: freakshow owners, abusive players, fans who boo any display of racial unity, assistant coaches who commit vehicular manslaughter, and a city whose claim to fame is two forms of music that multiple other cities did better. All so I can watch you guys get beaten with a switch by a Todd Bowles defense. Fuck off for good.
Ratto says: Their fans make alcoholism seem a lot less glamorous than it is. BEST NAME TO HEAR ON TV: Prince Tega Wanogho.
What might not suck: L’Jarius Sneed. Very good player.
HEAR IT FROM CHIEFS FANS!
Jordan:
I'm not mad; I'm actually laughing. This is all very funny to me.
Alan:
The Chiefs have comfortably assumed their role as placeholder gatekeepers in between Tom Brady accomplishments.
Bryan:
They went out with a hobbled, once-in-a-lifetime QB playing behind a papier mâché offensive line and changed exactly nothing about their gameplan to gift wrap Tom goddamn Brady his 600th Super Bowl.
Mitch:
Tom Brady’s smirk in the last Super Bowl is everything that’s broken in America. That’s the smirk of every Fox News host, of every rich asshole asking to see the manager, of every law being undone, of every injustice being perpetrated. Of course the smirk won - that same fucking smirk we’ve been seeing for 20 years. Of course it did.
Keith:
The most exciting team in the league with the loudest stadium in the league is going to play in front of zero fans this season because the entire state either has COVID or is locked up for storming the Capitol.
Brian:
Mahomes’ mom is a real fuckin’ liability.
Spencer:
You cannot drive, listen or watch anything local without Patrick Mahomes shilling for everything from a bank to cereal.
We are so stupid that I, a 32-year-old, healthy, non-essential worker could get the vaccine in early April. After the prick, the nurses asked me if I had friends who could come in to get a vaccination due to a surplus. IN APRIL.
Charles:
You better believe Clark Hunt graduated from SMU.
Gilbert:
I work at an elementary school in Kansas near KC metro. The week of the Super Bowl, the staff decided to have a Chiefs themed pep week. One of these themed days was a Cheetah print day to honor Tyreek Hill. Our school day looked like something out of Carole Baskin's wet dream. Bright red and cheetah print to celebrate a guy who assaulted his pregnant girlfriend and also got away with abusing and threatening his own kid.
We deserved to our ass kicked in the Super Bowl.
Jeremy:
Clyde Edward-Helaire never met a four-man front he couldn't struggle to get three whole yards against.
Brett:
Frank Clark is an absolute piece of shit who we traded a first-rounder for AND paid a fuckton of money for so that he could drive around Los Angeles with a car full of SMGs like he's hunting Sarah Connor.
Brandon:
I knew it was going tits up when the “best option“ was Remmers at left tackle and I flashed back to him showing his entire ass against Von Miller in Super Bowl 50.
Kyle:
Going to a home game is like watching a stadium half filled with good, polite fans and the other half of drunken, belligerent fans who probably went to that Tulsa MAGA rally.Owner Clark Hunt looks like a knockoff Ken doll you’d find at a Goodwill.
Nick:
Sure, let’s continue to spot every team we play three touchdowns before realizing we’re actually playing football game. That definitely won’t come back to bite us in an important game.
I own a bootleg Glenn Dorsey jersey that I ordered from China and my credit card was hacked three days later.My therapist is underpaid.Fuck you.
Kyle:
Mecole Hardman couldn't run a correct route if a Bazookas girl walked him through it.
We still lead the nation in unused, blighted downtown parking lots and locals that look like tourists.
Dennis:
There's no way we get another Super Bowl before I, a 37 year-old, am in the retirement home. Our lot in life is to live off of our one morsel for decades. It has to be that way. Anything more and our Awe Shucks I Wear Overalls Unironically facade melts away and we become Bostonians of the Great Plains.
Conor:
I love being a Chiefs fan but I've encountered the absolute worst people on Earth everytime I go to Arrowhead and it's usually Cleatus the slackjawed yokel wearing a Tamarick Vanover jersey that he's been wearing every day since 1997.
Gavinsky:
Because the Chiefs have a vested interest in misappropriating Native American symbology but also have an interest in trying to avoid the horrific fate of having to change their name, the Chiefs have retired their mascot, a horse named “Warpaint.” Are they doing anything about the Tomahawk Chop that is started and sustained by the crowd? No. Are they changing the name of Arrowhead Stadium? No. Will they still bang a giant “war drum” as part of the pregame ritual? You best your ass they will. The Chiefs simply cannot get enough of half-measures.
Kevin:
Go ahead and change the team name. The chuds will get over it as long as they win.
Zachary:
I’m a monster now. Anytime I talk to anyone about football, it’s always as if the Chiefs are an inevitability. I watched us utterly shit the bed in true Kansas City fashion in the Super Bowl and openly questioned the fairness of the league. I opined that the referees were told to ignore anything the Bucs were doing. I am disgusting. I am a pile of shit sitting in one of the porta potties in the Truman sports complex parking lot after some poor soul on the borderline of alcohol poisoning let loose his gastrointestinal cannons full of pulled pork, smoked brisket and enough cheesy corn to fill Arrowhead’s lower bowl into it. I can’t fucking stop myself from being a smug arrogant asshole to any fan of any other team.
Alex:
We're the idiots who let Tom Brady prove it was him all along and not Belichick. It's only a matter of time before our mush-brained spoiled rich kid owner is forced to change the name to something that isn't mildly racist and stirs up every redneck within 300 miles to hurl insults at the nearest minority.
Vikram:
Maybe one title was enough.
Mark:
I went to a Chiefs game about 10 years ago and, while tailgating, spotted a fan with a jersey that had six names of early-round defensive tackles that we whiffed on over the course of the previous eight years…luminaries such as Eric Downing, Ryan Sims, Junior Siavii, Turk McBride, Glenn Dorsey, and Alex Magee. No, you don’t remember any of them.
This was right around the time Jovan Belcher committed a murder suicide, with the suicide part happening directly in front of the GM.
How does the team respond? They basically say “We can’t be 3-13 AND have historically bad character as a team. Let’s REALLY lean into the bad character and hope nobody notices because we hired a Santa Claus impersonator to be the head coach who can usually field a winning team.” So congrats to us, we have our winning team with no fewer than four recent/current players and coaches (Frank Clark, Tyreek Hill, Britt Reid, Kareem Hunt) who make Adrian Peterson look like a saint.
For further proof that God hates all of us, we concurrently stumbled into the new NFL QB golden boy (given our draft history there’s no way this was anything other than sheer luck or shitty divine intervention) and all the horrible things this team does will absolutely get swept under the rug. We are now the NFL poster boys for the Brave New World where decency doesn’t matter at all.
I still want the Chiefs to win the Super Bowl every year because I’m a bad person who thinks that the 30 years of mediocrity that I put up with outweighs the damage that this team is doing to society as a whole.
Charles:
Your average West Texas rancher would be taken aback by how many Trump signs they see once they get 45 minutes from downtown Kansas City as I write this in the summer of 2021.
After years of Martyball, we have made sure the team is mostly stocked with replacement level players to ensure that Patrick Mahomes is the next Aaron Rodgers and not the next Tom Brady. When Patrick shows up at training camp 15 years from now he will still only have one ring, but he will also look cool in his shades and I will still believe he is going to win that second Super Bowl ring in his swan song.
Submissions for the Defector NFL previews are closed. Next up: Tampa Bay Buccaneers
