Over the past few years, Chiefs Kingdom has seen a heightened sense of “arriving” on the national stage — international, too — beginning with the arrival of head coach, Andy Reid, and star quarterback, Alex Smith. The organization saw exponential levels of exposure following the 2017 NFL Draft, when general manager John Dorsey, Brett Veach, and his team, traded up to select quarterback Patrick Mahomes II from Texas Tech with the 10th pick in the 1st round. Changes have included national media exposure, tremendous growth of the fan-base, exposure in countries outside the United States. While many hard-nosed and old-school veterans of Chiefs Kingdom have their fair share of complaints, it should be noted that there are many reasons to embrace the hype and fresh attention with open arms.
Bandwagon Fans
Possibly the most significant and most interesting dynamic of this theory of welcoming the recent changes/evolution of Chiefs Kingdom, along with that of the kind/amount of attention the organization garners presently, is that of the “bandwagon fan.”
Bottom line: old fans hate new fans, have difficulty accepting them, tell them metaphorically to “get off my lawn!” Frequently we may observe occurrences on social media (or even at a game) of an older (longer-tenured, not trying to be “age-ist” here) Chiefs fan saying something like “back in my day, sonny!” (okay, that was a little age-ist!). They might say, “I was a fan when the team was really bad (insert the Grbacs, Thigpens, etc), and you weren’t – so I don’t like you!” They might also say, “I’ve been a fan for a really long time, and that makes me better than you!” Generally, they complain about new Chiefs fans and do so publicly.
Fans are proud, and that’s okay. Each fan has every right to be proud not only of their team, but of their own loyalty to that team. What is not okay is this sort of destructive, harmful behavior from/toward our fellow fans: putting down others in order to make oneself feel good, powerful, wise, etc.
Be proud of your fandom, but also be accepting and welcoming of others who want to join in that fandom: even if they’re asking what seems to you a stupid question on your favorite Chiefs-related Facebook page and remember, you were once a new fan as well and most likely had the same “stupid” question at some point.
Nobody is hurting or harming you in any way by becoming a new Chiefs fan. It could be:
- someone who never followed the NFL, and now they love watching the explosive Chiefs offense
- someone who was always more of a casual fan of the NFL, but who is a Texas Tech fan and has basically followed Mahomes from his early days
- someone who married a Chiefs fan and married into Chiefs Kingdom
- a person who’s primary passion used to be another sport, but for whatever reason they have lost interest in that sport and decided to give their sports-watching commitments to football, and their allegiance to the Chiefs.
There are so many ways that one can become a Chiefs fan and whatever their reason(s) may be, don’t be a hater, and don’t rub it in their faces that you are a better fan than they are. Chiefs Kingdom is a great big united family of amazing fans, and we want to make that family bigger and keep it close, not tear it apart and alienate those who want to simply join the family. Furthermore, there are benefits to being the newly-crowned king on the hill and the most hyped team in the most popular sport in the United States.
National Media Attention
For the non-bandwagon fans, recall the years when a real effort was required to gather news, information and media content about the Chiefs. Try to go back and remember the days when your main source of valued information was most likely the Kansas City Star, local radio, and local beat writers who covered the organization. Remember when you wouldn’t see much about the Chiefs on ESPN because, honestly, there wasn’t much to cover. There wasn’t much of anything that was worthy of national attention, and certainly not worthy of international attention. As fans who had a strong bias towards our team, we would eat up anything we could get and we just had to dig a little to get to it.
Things have changed in this regard, and in a way that any Chiefs fan should happily embrace, but there are still plenty who have something negative to say. First thing we have to do as Chiefs fans is face the fact that not everyone else in the world is a Chiefs fan. Now, that being said, we should never expect every talking head at ESPN, Yahoo Sports, NFL.com, NBC Sports — and the list goes on — to say,
“Mahomes and Reid and the whole Chiefs organization is the greatest thing to happen to the world ever… and they’re going to go undefeated every year for the rest of time… and win every Super Bowl… and Mahomes is going to win every MVP award… and shatter every record… and then get elected President of the United States!”
Guys — and gals — like Colin Cowherd, Stephen A. Smith, Will Cain, Mike Golic, Max Kellerman, Skip Bayless — and again, the list goes on — are paid to give their “takes” about sports.
We all know that Nick Wright from the ESPN show “First Things First,” is a die-hard Chiefs fan. He shows it, and his co-hosts give him a hard time about it because it’s not their job to be fans on the show. Their job is to talk back and forth about what’s happening in sports, and give takes… and we all know that “hot takes” simply generate more interest than “cold takes.” Even if you, the fan, are cursing out Colin Cowherd for something he said about the Chiefs that, to you, is completely blasphemous, you’re still watching, and watching is good for their business. Additionally, for every take that you disagree with, there is also a lot of really positive attention out there to be found. Why? Simple, the Chiefs are one of the hottest topics in sports right now. With that, we in Chiefs Kingdom should always embrace that national media attention.
International Exposure
Believe it or not, the NFL team based in Kansas City, Missouri, has a surprisingly solid international presence. It may be impossible to trace back to where exactly this began specifically. The league’s international activities go back to a time not long after the turn of the century, when not-so-fruitful pre-season games were played worldwide, dubbed: “American Bowl” and there was NFL Europe (or NFL Europa), a European developmental league. These ventures died out by 2007. The first regular season NFL game to be played outside the US was a game between the Arizona Cardinals and the San Francisco 49ers, on Oct. 2, 2005: that game was played at Estadio Azteca, in Mexico City.
It would not be until 2015 when the Chiefs saw their first international play and they were on their way to an 11-5 regular season and a playoff berth. Andy Reid was in his 3rd season as the Chiefs head coach, and Alex Smith was in his 3rd year as the starting QB (he was also selected as an alternate for the Pro Bowl that season). On Nov. 1, the Chiefs defeated the Detroit Lions, 45-10, before a crowd of 83,624 spectators at Wembley Stadium in London.
Then in 2018, the Chiefs were scheduled to meet the Los Angeles Rams on Nov. 19 at Estadio Azteca. This game would be cancelled due to poor field conditions, but the team would make it to Mexico the following season. On Nov. 18, 2019, the Chiefs played and beat the Los Angeles Chargers, 24-17, in front of a crowd of 76,252. These games — along with increased team success — have solidified the Chiefs organization as one of the more popular NFL franchises on the international market – with fans ranging from Mexico, Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany, Poland, Australia, and even Taiwan.
Expanded Chiefs Content
Chiefs success has also seen a rise in interest and production of Chiefs-related content, from written pieces — such as what we produce here at ArrowheadOne — to blogs, to radio shows, to podcasts. Podcasting has seemingly taken the multimedia world by storm of the past many years in general, and as the Chiefs have established themselves on the greatest stage across the country and around the world, Chiefs-related podcasts have taken off.
Many established pods, including official Chiefs pods like: “In the Trenches” and “Defending the Kingdom.”
Those have been joined by a host of pods that have enjoyed great success that seems to have coincided with that of the team in recent years. Shows like:
- Locked on Chiefs
- Arrowhead Pride
- SportsBeat KC
- Arrowheads Abroad
- Chiefs 1st & 10
- Arrowhead Guys and,
- The Kingdom Outsiders
These highlight just a handful of current Chiefs podcasts. One such pod, known as “It’s Always Sunny in Chiefs Kingdom,” hosted by Austin and Taylor, started producing shortly after the Chiefs’ victory in Super Bowl LIV. According to Austin, they felt right away that the time was right, and they have since enjoyed a wild ride as the hot new Chiefs pod out there:
“When the clock hit zero in Super Bowl LIV, Taylor and I had to talk about it. Both of us have been obsessed with Chiefs football for a long time, but especially since April 27, 2017. From the night Patrick Mahomes was announced as the Chiefs’ quarterback of the future, we just knew he was going to be a star. The podcast started as an extension of that. We figured, since we would be talking about the Chiefs anyway, we might as well record it and see if anyone wanted to listen. The name – It’s Always Sunny In Chiefs Kingdom – was a nod to our favorite TV show, It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia, but it was also the perfect description for the experience of being a Chiefs fan in February 2020. We had a pretty good response to the podcast right out of the gate, but just six episodes in, we were contacted about partnering with Sports Illustrated’s new Chiefs site, Arrowhead Report, and of course we jumped at the opportunity. There are a lot of great Chiefs podcasts out there, but what we’ve found is that Chiefs fans will listen to them all, including our humble little show. It’s been a tough year generally, but every week we sit down to talk Chiefs, that stuff kind of melts into the background for a couple of hours. I think that’s part of the appeal to the listener. We don’t go out of our way to be all sunshine and roses all the time – it’s just that, literally, it’s always sunny in Chiefs Kingdom! Every week, it seems like, we’re talking about another key player Veach has managed to squeeze into the salary cap, or reminiscing about a great win, or talking about the fact that Patrick freaking Mahomes is our quarterback. It’s great. We never set out to partner with SI or get a sponsorship or any of that, it just happened – because Chiefs Kingdom is crazy for content and has generously supported us.”
The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
There is one more thing to consider as we ponder the heightened attention and hype surrounding the Chiefs organization over the past few years: dynasties are really, REALLY hard to come by in the NFL. It is a league that might be just as, or even more, competitive than any other of the major sports leagues. There are fewer games in a season, injuries play a huge factor in determining every team’s success from year to year, the playoffs (for those who get there) is single game elimination, weather plays more of a factor, and of course, we’re all familiar with the saying, “on any given Sunday.” As bright as the Chiefs future looks right now, we can never truly predict how the future of the franchise will play out. So, Chiefs fans, take it all in – the good, the bad, and the ugly — and cherish these sweet moments while they last.
James S. McGregor — ArrowheadOne
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