The big epiphany for me regarding this weekend's game.
 

Yes, I love that they finally won a home playoff game.

Yes, I love that they finally beat the Colts.

Yes, I love that they are in the AFC Championship game for the first time since before I was married or had kids.

Yes, I will weep like a baby if they even make it to the Super Bowl, let alone win it.

But no - I won't be devastated if they lose on Sunday. I'll be disappointed, sure. But I won't be crushed.

Why? Because they got beat by Tom Brady. Tom Brady, as we hear so often, is 41 years old.

Patrick Mahomes is TWENTY THREE.

In the past, "there's always next year" was a phrase held in derision by Chiefs fans.

That's no longer the case. Because Mahomes. There actually IS next year. In fact, Tom Brady is FORTY ONE. There's going to be "next year", as a Chiefs fan, for the next DECADE AND A HALF!

So here's to a win on Sunday, which the Chiefs and their fans richly deserve, and I honestly think they will get. However, if they don't?

There's always next year.

They will win Sunday. Changing of the guard. Passing the torch.

I feel the exact same way. But since the Chiefs have exceeded expectations so far this year, I want them to win it all now and put Brady out to pasture.

Screw that noise. Ask Marino about waiting til next year.

We’re going to open a 40 lb box of rape on the Pats.

**** that. Super Bowl or bust.

Absolutely for sure.

I feel the same way, but also loved that we were playing NE for 2 reasons:

If we played The Chargers and went to the SB, that is obviously a beautiful thing, but if we lost to RIVERS??? Im not sure I could recover.

PAtriots? WE beat them? We beat the best! The Dynasty! The GOAT! Nothing sweeter than beating the best!
We lose? It will sting for sure, but I'll recover bc of all of the above.

Best scenario IMO

I never said ANYTHING about waiting until next year. :facepalm:

You literally said “there’s always next year”.

Except it's not Super Bowl or bust.

They literally will be in this position year in and year out until Patrick Mahomes is gone. It's that simple.

They're going to beat the Pats, I firmly believe they will.

But if they don't, this isn't Joe Montana in 1994. This isn't the only chance they're ever going to get.

:toast:

Here's to the day when the whole country is sick of the CHIEFS being in the Super Bowl practically every year!

I literally said I believe they're going to win Sunday.

There's no doubt I'll be devastated if we lose. It's tough to get this close to the goal and not actually get the thing done.

But then I'll go back and watch all of the Mahomes highlights from the game and realize that he's too good NOT to get there one of these years.

It'll be OK.

This has been a great year to be a Chiefs fan. I think Chiefs fans are better equipped to deal with disappointment better than anybody else, so if we win it's just icing on the cake. I honestly believe that we are going to win though.


But...If we don't win...I'm not even going to watch the Patriots in another Super Bowl, what's the point? Sick of that team and their smug fans.

I just can't foresee any way I'll be crushed like I was say in 2003 or 1997.

Why?

Because this isn't a fluke. For one, I never expected them to be here in the first place. Second, just making the AFC Championship game seems like a dream that would NEVER be fulfilled. But the icing on the cake is that we finally have Patrick Mahomes and he's not just any 1st round QB, he's THE 1st round QB. He's the new NFL, the prototype.

So yeah, I expect a victory on Sunday. That's my brain. My heart will be disappointed if they lose. But it's not "the end" like it has been so many times before. It won't be for me, anyway.

I'd feel better if there weren't an obvious lockout coming the season after next.

Nice sentiment and all, but we’re going to win.

I get what you are saying but I would be pretty devastated if the Chiefs lose to an aging and overrated patriots team next weekend at home. A loss in the SB would be easier to take (though still suck).

That said, I expected this team to be 7-9 to 9-7 due to a shit defense, a brutal schedule and growing pains by PM2 so this whole process as been pretty amazing.

Just need two more wins and I get to leave CP forever.

One thing that is different about this year is we have been so fortunate not to have any devastating injuries.

This is such a great opportunity.

Oh we're going to win.

NFL coaching contracts are being written with the expectation of a 2021 work stoppage.

I guess I'm drawing a line between disappointment and devastation.

I'll probably cry for a few minutes. Mope around on the way home and resume my life on Monday.

That's quite a bit different than being mad about it for months afterwards. ;)

It's a golden opportunity.

My entire attitude has changed since they scored that final touchdown on Saturday.

Up until then, I was a miserable, paranoid whipped dog, sure that somehow everything was going to go to shit - that there would be a lost fumble, or an interception, some sort of series of freak plays/bad calls/wide left/fifth down/whatever and it would all go sideways at the end.

Then, in an instant, the monkey was gone. The curse was lifted. Last week I was a nervous wreck. Now, I'm fine. The only thing I'm worried about is driving in shitty weather on Saturday.

It's like I've been freed from prison.

THAT I had not heard. That's interesting.

That's EXACTLY how I feel right now.

Yep. Free from the curse of the coach that shall not be named. 1 game erased 31 years of chiefs and opened up a new outlook on the future. Just need two more games then my fandom is complete.

I agree with that. I think the game is about 50/50, wouldn't be surprised at anything that happens or that upset if we lose. I'll probably feel like the 2014 World Series again. Disappointed in a way, but mostly just excited for next year.

Well, I'll be upset at all the money I spent on it, but hey. There's no shame in losing to Brady and Belichick in the playoffs; everyone has.

The Pats are the past, and maybe still the present, but we are the future. This team is on the way up and it's not like our window is closing.

Don't let your anxiety get the best of you now thus making pre-reasons in order to ease your emotional pain IF we lose. Embrace the victory NOW mentally and emotionally because that is how Champions become CHAMPIONS !!

CHAMPIONS embrace and apply these 2 HUGE concepts mentioned in these 2 little verses from scripture whether they realize it or not.

Proverbs 29:18 - "Where there is no vision the people perish".

Proverbs 23:7 - "For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he".

See the victory won by truly believing in your heart NOW !!!

This victory will happen 'htismaqe' just embrace it NOW !!:clap:

Off a year -whatever though it's nice to know the majority of Mahomes' cheap years are before the lockout.

I'm not actually playing in the game btw

Here is how it's going to go down...

The Chiefs are going to beat the Patriots and then WIN the Super Bowl.

On stage, during the VICTORY Ceremony, Patrick is going to ask his girlfriend to marry him on national TV. She is going to say yes. Then the whole country will fall in love with our good, wholesome and polite Quarterback, Patrick Mahomes II.

Also, Pat Senior will be crying. As will Patricks mom. Clark and Andy will give each other a big hug. Clark is gonna be happier than a pig in shit. Then Patrick will get the MVP and all will be right with the world.

KC will throw a big VICTORY parade and everybody will behave. Clay will makes some kick arse video, and we will all be grateful and happy here on Chiefs Planet awaiting the draft and next season.

It's gonna be good. :)

The lesson of Marino is absolutely correct. There is no guarantee about next year. Its football and shit happens you never thought would. The opportunity is now, they must seize it now!

Hedging your bet is all you are doing.

Yeah. NE is a tough out no matter what. Brady can’t beat you in as many ways as he used to but he still has a lot of ways to win. Belicheat is still the best coach in the game. By a lot.

A bounce or two and it could be over.

But like you said it’s not a fluke.

Same exactly.

The country already has my friend.;)

The problem is this: it's the Patriots. THE PATRIOTS. They are probably my most hated team in all of professional sports. With probably my most hated fanbase in all of professional sports. If we manage to beat them this year, it serves as notice that a/ we're the new "it" team in the AFC and b/ they're on their last legs. It's also so mellifluously poetic to have vanquished the Colts and the Patriots en route to a Super Bowl in an already-magical season.

We'll have other opportunities and that's great. We'll win other Super Bowls and that's amazing. But it will never be quite as perfect as this. As Chiefs fans, we will never replicate what we've been through this season and I just realllllllllly want more out of it.

Well, you're not wrong.

With that said, I guess theres only one thing left to do.

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Holy shit, I just had the same conversation with a co-worker. Damn near to the word.

I had an epiphany this weekend too.

My son is barely starting to get into sports. He asked me, "Hey dad, who won the game?"

Me: "The Chiefs"

Him: "Let's GO!"

And it struck me. My son will get to grow up a Chiefs fan w/o ever having to know the misery of decades past. Pat Mahomes won't be retiring until my son is in his late 20's/early 30's.

And BTW Htismaqe, i agree with everything you said.

1. I'm not a champion. I don't play for the Chiefs. NOTHING I do (short of screaming my freaking lungs out at the game on Sunday) will affect the outcome of the game.

2. I have ZERO anxiety. None. Zilch. I'm not concerned AT ALL.

3. For the 4th or 5th time today, they're going to win on Sunday.

Dude, this gave me goosebumps.

That's a lesson for the Chiefs. I'm not the Chiefs, I'm a fan.

How do you suppose Dolphin fans felt after the "lesson of Marino". That's right, they didn't actually learn that lesson until AFTER HE RETIRED.

Wrong. Nice try though.

Quite the change you have made since the earlier in the season "must win it all now" narrative. Not saying that's a bad thing, just something I noticed.

Sounds like your son is a bandwagon rider.


/s

I get what you're saying but "hate" is an emotion. Take the emotion out of it.

It's the Patriots. 5-time Super Bowl champion. They gone to EIGHT STRAIGHT AFC championship games. This isn't going to be easy.

That being said, the Chiefs are going to win on Sunday and those facts are going to make the victory all that more meaningful.

Yeah, it truly is. I guess it just took me a season of Mahomes to purge my system of the last 30 years of being a Chiefs fan.

Could not have said it better myself. I truly believe we should be thrilled that this team went well beyond where they should be at this point in his career, as our future is very bright.

That said...

https://scottlattablog.files.wordpre...018/01/win.gif

Unfortunately the Patriots are not going away. They have 12 draft picks coming up, will have plenty of cap space with Gronk retiring and will be a much stronger team moving forward.

Probably have their replacement QB on the team leave as well.

hey

damn it

A much stronger team maybe. However, if their new QB isn't at least 75% percent Brady, they're not the contender they are. It's that simple.

Yep. I was a wreck all last week, but am feeling pretty damn good right now!

This is pretty much where I'm at. I'll be physically sick if the ****ing Pats punch their ticket to yet another Super Bowl at the Chiefs' expense.



Any other team I could deal with. But not them. **** them.

I'm so happy with how this season has turned out for the Chiefs, I don't even care about that.

I mean, if the Pats win, that's another Sunday afternoon I have free. I don't have to watch the Super Bowl.

I am at peace no matter the outcome.

A lot to be excited about next year as well. Promising young talent on both sides of the ball. Houston will restructure to free up some money. Berry will restructure & have the bone spur shaved down. Sorensen will get cut to free up a chunk of change. Ford will be back (tag or use money from Berry-Houston restructure). A lot to be excited about looking forward.

So weird, same thing happened to me.

Veach even said that at the beginning of the year he’d thought it wouldn’t be a Super Bowl team, however Mahomes has proven him wrong

I was a basketcase. I'd say the ratio between dreading acceptance of impending doom, grim determination that things would finally change, and actual happiness was about 80/19/1. Hell, I left work early on Friday because I was freaking out. And there was a thread about it, too - I certainly wasn't the only one. People must have thought I was an idiot for carrying on like that.

And now, it's just..... gone. How liberating.

I can tell you for sure that most Pats fans are not smug. We know how lucky we are.

Nothing personal here my friend, but I'm with eDave that you are emotionally hedging your bet here with your epiphany as I read between the lines.

Nothing personal here my friend, but you're wrong.

Even if we lose this game, at the end I will stare into the night, sigh deeply and mutter to myself quietly like Col. Kilgore in Apocalypse Now.

"Someday this war's gonna end."

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I'm still upset about Kimble Anders turning an easy TD into an INT before halftime at Buffalo. We could have gone in down 7 with momentum.

At least once a month I fantasize about Salvy hitting a 2-run dinger to win the 2014 WS.

Pretty sure I'll be upset if we lose this.

Yep. My wife thought I was ****ing nuts, and she knows how passionately I follow the Chiefs...she tried to tell me it was a just a game...that conversation did not go well.

I will be upset. It's a GOLDEN opportunity. But by Monday, I'll be over it.

When the Chiefs lost in 2003 for example, I was legitimately depressed for a couple of weeks.

It's not easy to get HFA in the NFL. You have to take advantage when you get the golden opportunity.

I'm not gonna be upset.

I'm gonna freeze Mahomes in carbonite.

Stick the Big Dick Mahomet up the little Patriots' ass like Brady shoving his tongue down the throat of his son.

And I can tell you that most people who say they know how lucky they are, still don't really appreciate it until their luck changes.

But its still worth trying to keep some perspective.

How did you NOT see that trainwreck coming?

After Ontarrio Smith and the Vikings RAPED us and Clinton Portis hoisting the championship belt over our heads...I knew Indy would roll us that week or the Pats would have the week after.

Now, following year, I WAS crushed. I seriously thought the defense would miraculously improve with Gunther back at DC, but it didn't. In fact, even though our offense was better (the Ray Lewis "they holding and double teaming me every play" MNF game, the 8 rushing TD game vs Atlanta, the Colts Halloween ambush, etc), the defense actually somehow got worse and we finished like 7-9.

****, we never made the playoffs again in the Vermeil era after 2003. That was that team's 'window'. Think about THAT for a second.

I have a feeling it's not even going to be close. Chiefs win 38-24 (or any combination of a two td win)

One block on Scott Fujita and the Chiefs edge out the Steelers for a wild card berth the year Rapistburger won it all.

Its a Blood Moon on Game Day
It is destiny.

My wife is a die hard Braves fan, and they haven't won shit forever either, so she understands my pain.

And is smart enough to leave me the **** alone when I get like that. :D