Chiefs: Grasping for the Ring

Chiefs: Grasping for the Ring

David Bell

It all begins and ends with a trophy: The Lombardi. Pro Football’s main goal and achievement. I think back and find a… grasping for the ring… in so many ways. They say that it takes 8 to 10 top flight players to grasp the ring and win it all. They say that KC is short the “Requisite” talent. See my list later for what I think is the answer… but first?

I Think Back

 We have progressed since the disaster of 2012. In so many ways that it is almost an unfathomable achievement. Four seasons in a row, the Chiefs have won their way to a winning record. In three of those seasons, they have been on the cusp of going the distance and at least gone to post season competition.

I think back to the 2013 finale. I keep seeing Bowe’s foot land just out of bounds. Inches away from being a catch. Inches away from a FG attempt that would have propelled that team forward. Who knows from there? It was improbable as it was. A season that saw a 9-0 streak. A season where Alex Smith almost carried the team over the line.

I think back to the improbable… in a lot of things. So this brings me, at this late date in my timeline, to the mid-1960s and my own experiences. I think back to a 3-over time game at the small crackerbox court at Midway and a 7^th grader who could not properly shoot a free throws. Coach always said, “Give it all, to the very last drop.” The ball from a “friend” on the opposing team bounced off the rim and I passed it out after the rebound, trailing by one, I think it was. The clock in the game is running down and we had already tied in the previous two overtimes. We went the length of the short court and someone, I can’t recall who it was now, made a shot that went awry, I took the ball off the backboard and put it back in with seconds to go for the big trophy. That was what, 1965? Same team, State playoffs, we were pretty good but not great, 19-4. Playing the same guard who took that shot that I rebounded. Coach moved me to guard in the zone to try to stymie the shooter who was now playing for Harrisonville. We fell short in the State Tourney. I think we had the better “5.” They proved different.

It’s a game dang-it!

For the Record

That was the first winning basketball record in that school. We stacked trophies in the case that are long forgotten. Our football team won 6 games. Heavens, we lost to St. Mary’s of Independence, Midway (DANG THEM), who became State Champs. And St. Mary’s was their single defeat of Midway that season. I watched the Championship game from the sideline. I knew all the players on the opposing squad at Midway. He!!, we played each other each season at least twice in basketball and once in football. One of the players for St. Mary’s went on to become a Green Bay Packer.

Back then? It was small school stuff. The smallest rural schools — Consolidated — in the state. I remember Archie, you know, that hole in the road on 71 Hwy South, take their team to the State Championship game. Another crackerbox court. They played a zone and coach Woods got so frustrated he put me in at guard. Here I was, a Freshman, playing one of the top teams in the state and you know what? I played well. I broke their full court press three times with a  pass. Of all the moments of my time playing sports, that may be the most memorable. Our Freshman team went 14-0. Three 1^st place trophies. Then three of us were moved to the Varsity team. So it goes.

I Think Back: The Chiefs

Growing up, I remember watching the Colts with Unitas, watching Green Bay. Or Cleveland. We didn’t have our own team. Back in about 57, a photographer who lived next door — for the K.C. Star — took photos of several of us kids, playing backyard football in the yard and it made the front page. A bunch of kids, reaching for the “ring”.

When the Chiefs finished out the 1965 season it was a bit dreary. 7-5-2? Like that. But the next season, they won the AFC west, 11-2-1. They beat the Bills in the playoffs. This was the first AFL Championship after the team arrived in KC and became the Chiefs.

Flash back: 1958, or something like that, and then 63 and we had a team to root for. It was magnificent. Our own football team on TV even if it was the AFL. And I loved the AFL because it was in opposition to the NFL, which looked down it’s collective nose at the “fledgling league.” Lamar Hunt had wanted to purchase an existing NFL franchise and could not get it done. He and others came up with a huge idea: start a new pro football league.

1966 saw the Chiefs fall to the Pack big time… but the first half? It was still possible. The finale? 35-10. Green Bay’s HC said he didn’t believe the AFL could contend with NFL teams. 1966 saw the Dolphins added to the AFL and the Dolphins improbable win in the “Longest Game” was another view of reaching for the “ring.” The dastardly Raiders had the next shot at the “NFL-AFL Championship. Then the Jets who turned the world upside-down. Then the Chiefs over Minnesota. In no case, 1966 through the Chiefs win in the 1970 Superbowl, were any AFL teams regarded as capable of winning the trophy. However, the architect of Chiefs football was Hank Stram. He was a sometimes genius.

It was all superb football for the young and old alike. I think back now and how tied I was to the Chiefs when they arrived from Dallas. They practiced [training camp] at William Jewel College in Liberty. My Sr. year in HS, get this, I dated a young lady from Liberty and that was what, 70 miles from home? In 1964, our Church had summer camp at William Jewell and I was able to see many Chief’s players at the evening meal. We all shared the same cafeteria. Seeing and meeting players who would later contend for the first, so called Super Bowl. Wow.

Dave Hill and another player, can’t recall whom it was, came to speak at our Letterman’s club banquet in 1967. I won a letter as a Freshman, starting the last 3 games of that season. Later, I was awarded 4 All-Conference Awards in my… 3 more “senior” years. One season: it was one on offense, one on defense. As I said, it was a small school and I played both ways.

Back to the ring. I can say this: the Chiefs are a better football team than many I hear uttering words of fatalism. These men are going for the ring. I believe this, I truly do. A team is a “Sum” of it’s many parts and for me? I see huge opportunity. Because no one else believes.

Sometimes, it is the underdog that takes the field and sweeps in an improbable victory. Sometimes, the NFL and all it’s experts are just plain wrong. Sometimes, all that talent for evaluating things, professional and amateur alike, is just plain wrong.

I think 2017 is just the place KC needs to be. I am calling it now: 13-3. I think you are all wrong. I think Alex Smith will lead this team to greater heights. I think our top flight players are present, enough to win it all.

Let me tell you who they will be, because you might see them as good, not great but in 2017, things will prove my point.

1.  Alex Smith will have the best season he has ever had under Center.
2.  Mitch Morse will make the Pro Bowl.
3.  Mitch Schwartz returns to Pro Bowl form at right tackle.
4.  Tyreek Hill has a Pro Bowl knock-them-dead season at WR and adds Special Teams contributions for Toub’s warriors.
5.  Not making the Pro Bowl but having a run game season out of the gate which will be admired: Kareem Hunt will showcase and balance the attack giving the Chiefs a threat on the ground and in the air.
6.  The Right Tackle, Mitch Schwartz will win honors to the same level as Morse, even if the league doesn’t view him that way.
7.  A compliment for Ty Hill will be a lesser honored WR, who might or might not win credos but who will play lights out – Chris Conley.
8. & 9. On Defense, our three stellar players will make opposing defenses play to the opposite side: Justin Houston and Derrick Johnson will have years to remember

   10. & 11. Eric Berry and Marcus Peters will make Pro Bowl Honors seem simple.

Is this a team that can win the Super Bowl? Count the players I have noted and add one more. In his second season, Chris Jones, DE in the 3-4, will have a season which propels him to the future.

Does it take 8? Or 10? List them again and even with no post season pro bowl or all pro for all of them, I have given you 12 reasons to believe in the Chiefs as a team that will contend. That will… Grasp for the Ring.  Could I be wrong? Sure. But suddenly looking at the men who take the field in all three phases of the game give me reason to believe. And I do.

You take it from there, is the glass half empty? Or is it full because from the 12 players I have listed, I think there is more to this team than that. The Chiefs will be a sum of all their parts. For now? It is a goal which can be achieved. Those 53 men and the coaches and staff are “reaching for it.” For me? Just like 1966, this team can get to that game where the Hunt –er, Lombardi is awarded.

David Bell – Avery, Idaho

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