Kelly: NFL desperately needs a Chiefs dynasty to own sports globally | Opinion
The Marvel movie universe entered its peak when there was a Thanos, a super villain injecting chaos into the superhero world.
In that same vein, the sports world is better when there are dynasties.
The Los Angeles Lakers and Boston Celtics carried the NBA for decades, but the Chicago Bulls dynasty of the 1990s put professional basketball on the world’s radar.
Serena Williams and Tiger Woods in their primes took tennis and golf to new heights. Without them the ratings have dipped significantly.
The NFL is America’s most popular and profitable sports league, but if football is ever going to take down futbol, challenging for global sports supremacy, we have to embrace the Kansas City Chiefs dynasty.
Either that, or learn to look the other way.
The Chiefs, who on Sunday will face off against the Philadelphia Eagles in Super Bowl 59, are trying to become the first team to win three Super Bowls in a row.
Considering they received some favorable calls all season, including the AFC Championship Game against the Buffalo Bills, the running theory — or joke, depending on which team you root for — in the NFL is that anyone playing Kansas City has to not only beat the Chiefs, but also the league’s referees.
The theory/joke became so popular the league actually had to release a statement about it this week.
The alleged bias is akin to back in the Michael Jordan era, where there were “Jordan rules” that assisted in Chicago’s ability to win six championships during that NBA dynasty.
Who remembers Jordan’s pushoff on “The Last Shot?” against the Utah Jazz?
The refs made it a habit of looking the other way on Jordan because it was good for business, and if you haven’t realized the NFL’s refs are doing the same for the Chiefs you don’t realize how the billion-dollar business of sports governs how these games are called.
The Chiefs prove to the world that a small-market team can sit on the throne, reigning supreme with the right mix of talent, coaching and luck. And yes, luck is needed to get to the final game.
Since Patrick Mahomes took over as starting quarterback in the fall of 2018, he has led the Chiefs to a astounding 17-3 playoff run, with three Super Bowl wins.
And in those 20 postseason games, Kansas City has been assessed more penalty yards than the opposing team just three times.
The penalty tilt has noticeable in the past 12 Kansas City postseason games as Chiefs opponents have been flagged more 11 times, with one tie. Kansas City opponents have taken more penalty yards in 11 of those dozen games.
“There are many things that fans can worry about over a 17-game season, such as coaching decisions, player injuries, the weather and, yes, even close calls on incredible plays made by incredible athletes,” NFL Referees Association executive director Scott Green said in a statement “But you can rest assured that on every single down, NFL Officials, both on the field and in the replay booth, are doing everything humanly possible to officiate every play correctly.”
That doesn’t mean the refs don’t have a bias that impacts their calls, and how they see the games.
Let’s be honest, the better the NFL is as a whole, the stronger Green’s union is. More money for the league means more money for the referee workforce.
Dynasties are good for business. Kansas City draws a record-setting audience for the NFL.
It’s reported that 57.4 million viewers tuned in to Chiefs-Bills, the most ever for an AFC Championship Game.
The second Chiefs-Philadelphia Eagles Super Bowl, a rematch of Super Bowl 57 the Chiefs won, is a safe bet to set another viewership record.
That is why we need to embrace Chiefs coach Andy Reid — I mean Thanos — and his army of villains.
The casuals need Taylor Swift showing up for every Chiefs game to cheer on her man, tight end Travis Kelce.
The casual fans need Beyonce Christmas Day performances for Netflix, to drive in that new streaming revenue for the NFL.
The casuals need Kendrick Lamar performing “Not Like Us” at halftime of the Super Bowl, keeping those $7 million $8 million per 30 second ads sold.
If you understand the economics of the NFL, which is fueled by television rating and advertisers, you’d understand that the casual viewers need a reason to watch. And that the NFL wants all the eyeballs.
Having one dynasty franchise the NFL can count on to fill one-third to half the Sunday and Monday night prime time inventory of games is good for business, and so is becoming the NFL’s first three-peat of the modern era.
I’m not insinuating that these games are rigged because sports gambling is too large to pull off something like that, especially with the world watching. But a pass interference or roughing the passer call here and there just slants the odds in one team’s favor.
What I am insinuating is that any team that faces the Chiefs on this three-peat journey would have to knock the champs out as opposed to winning on the scorecard.
There’s money in rooting for the underdog too, but every good business needs its bell cow, a marquee sell, a Thanos, and that’s the Chiefs.
This story was originally published February 8, 2025 at 8:00 AM.
