It’s official: the Kansas City Chiefs rule the NFL. Not that that’s news to anyone, but after winning back-to-back Super Bowls, what good does it do to pretend?
We Chiefs haters used to be able to hold “no-dynasty-yet” status over their heads. After Sunday? Nah baby, nah. It’s the Chiefs world and we’re just living in it. What else is there to be said?
I know: the Chiefs are now “America’s Team.” Move over, Cowboys – you had your day. Actually, you’ve had quite a bit more than that. It’s been, what, three decades since your last Super Bowl? It’s time for a change.
And at this point, how are the Chiefs not “America’s Team?” They’ve got the rings, the quarterback, the coach, and the defense. It's the whole American-pie package. Am I forgetting anything?
Oh yeah, their Hall of Fame tight end Travis Kelce and his fourteen-time Grammy Award winning, genre-bending, arena-filling, generation-spanning, pop-culture icon girlfriend. Do I even need to say her name? If I can get through this entire article without saying it, do I get a prize?
But jokes aside, Travis Kelce’s dating life does matter to the Chiefs new “America’s Team” status. His musically-gifted girlfriend has – how should I put this – quite an active and engaged fanbase. And there are a lot of them. So many, in fact, that Travis Kelce’s girlfriend has brought a financial tidal wave to the NFL in the way of teenage girls with boy issues. Viewership among girls aged 12 - 17 is up an unbelievable 50%. I have a younger sister, and the concept of her voluntarily watching an NFL game when she was that age is about as foreign to me as willingly eating pangolin on a stick in a Chinese food market.
What really makes the Chiefs “America’s Team” isn’t just what they’ve brought to the table recently, it’s what the Cowboys haven’t – namely, anything at all. The last time the Cowboys reached the NFC Championship Game was the same year they last won the Super Bowl – which is to say, a long-ass time ago. It was so long ago, baseball hadn’t started interleague play, Google didn’t exist, and the WNBA’s first tip off was still months away. The Fast & Furious franchise has pumped out eleven mediocre movies since the Cowboys were last relevant.
If the ineptness of the Cowboys wasn’t enough, Kansas City is even more centrally located in the US than Dallas. And in today’s hyper-partisan political environment, Kansas/Missouri is way, way less controversial than Texas. Plus, who doesn’t get down with a little Kansas City BBQ, huh?
Furthermore, does anyone even know why the Cowboys are called “America’s Team?” It’s all thanks to some NFL Films writer named Bob Ryan back in 1978. One line of a highlight film took hold before anyone had a chance to do or say anything. Fortunately, we have the ability to correct that mistake. The time is now.
So, it’s time to come to terms with reality. The Chiefs are “America’s Team,” and they will be for some time. As a Bengals fan, it’s tough to admit, but it’s true. The Chiefs really do have it all. We all know Joe Burrow is the one man who can topple their dynasty, but for now, the Chiefs have conquered America. It should have been the New England Patriots taking the mantle from Dallas, but cheating scandals turned everyone against them. The Chiefs have had no such negative press. And unless they do, they’re going to keep their status as “America’s Team” for a long, long time.