The whole "they're getting everyone's best shot" thing seems a bit overblown to me. In a 17 game season.....everyone plays every week like that. [Reply]
The bottom line here is that the Chiefs are in the driver's seat for #1 seed. Last year they had to go on the road for most of the playoffs. Despite the issues, they're still in better shape than last year. [Reply]
I made this post, and didn't realize I was in the Xavier Worthy thread. :-) This seems like a better place for it.
I think it's important to keep a historical perspective on what we've done. Beating the Bills would have been huge, but the reality remains it's hard to win, it's doubly hard to win consistently. It's infinitely harder to do what we're trying to do. Which is why no one has done it.
Originally Posted by pugsnotdrugs19:
Which brings me here…
If you wanna denigrate Nagy, I think it can only be for not tapping into Mahomes’ max focus every week. Which may not even be possible for a coach to do at this stage of Pat’s career. But I think focus and attention to detail by players is what causes problems in these games, and if it’s like last year, it just isn’t near the same issue in the playoffs. Not for Patrick at least.
Originally Posted by Buehler445:
The part that nobody talks about is it is extraordinarily difficult to maintain focus from July to February. Hell the difference between being done in week 18 vs playing out the playoffs is substantial. That's one of a myriad of reasons it's hard to win consistently.
And it's not to say that we maintained focus through our run. We had bonehead plays and lack of execution sprinkled all throughout our run. And we'd get pissed off about it. The difference between then and now is we could fuck off for a few drives and then make some extraordinarily explosive plays and we won a lot of those games.
It's probably worth looking at our run.
2018 we had runs of 5 games, 4 games and 4 games
2019 we had runs of 4 games and 9 to close out the year. But we also lost 3 out of 4 and four out of 6 at one point. That's with healthy Fisher and Schwartz and prime Reek and Kelce.
2020 we ran the first 4 making the total run 13 games. Then we had a run of 10 games. Probably the most consistent football of the run.
2021 we had a run of 9 games to finish before the Bengals game (which mind you is the worst game Pat has ever played), but at one point we lost 2 out of 3 and 4 out of 6 at the beginning of the season. That's right. 7 weeks in we had a losing record.
2022 we had runs of 2 games, 2 games, and 6 games before 8 to win out.
2023 remember we had that dumbass Lions loss to keep the streak at 8. Then we had a run of 6 games, 1 game, and finished with 6 games.
2024 we started with 9 wins to make 15 total, the longest win streak of Pat's career and it had been 4 years since he'd been close. All while fighting some of the worst injury luck in the league, the pressure of a 3 peat, getting everybody's best shot because everybody hates us, and all the fucking miles of the last 6 years.
Given the history of best player of all time, it's pretty obtuse to sit here and say "ZOMGWTFBBQ THEY LOST FOCUS!!!!1123!!!!one" when they just ran through the best run of Pat's career while facing incomprehensible adversity. Further, the reality is that NO team maintains focus EVERY week. Belicheat was basically a movie bad guy and New England would shit the bed regularly (remember when they got their ass kicked in Arrowhead in September and Benched Brady?). If anyone could do it would be the dude that ran the franchise like a Nazi concentration camp.
Look, it would have been nice to win this one. It really would have set up the last half of the season.
I've said it before and I'll keep saying it. It's hard to win. It's doubly hard to win consistently. It is infinitely harder to do what we're trying to do. That's why no one has done it.
Originally Posted by nicksdad:
cool! another TrueFan GroupThink thread. let me explain something to you. people Are different. they have differing experiences both as fans and in real life that impacts how they root for their favorite football team . I became a fan in 1967 at the age of 9. those chiefs teams were AMAZING to root for. then we went through 50 years of nut punches. everyone makes fun of the Jets in terms of futility but until a few years ago we were the Jets. both teams had gone 50 years without a SB appearance let alone a win . that shapes how you watch games. I don't begrudge any fan's way of rooting for the Chiefs. the TrueFan competition is pretty tedious. when I need you to tell me how to root for my team I will let you know.
Originally Posted by Wisconsin_Chief:
At this point, there's no reason to doubt what this team can and will do in the playoffs. We all know this is nothing but an extended pre-season to these guys, which Kelce basically proved during the Bills game with his golf clap at the end of it. I almost think they are partially relieved that they lost. Taking every team's best shot week after week for 3-4 years has got to be more exhausting than anyone here can even imagine, not to mention they've literally played almost an entire extra season in that time, which is insane to think about.
I think people are getting bored, because the games just aren't exciting anymore. We look like the 2000s Patriots, and those games were just brutal to watch. People want all the high flying shit and blowing everyone out 52-10. It's just not realistic anymore, and you need to adjust your mindset accordingly. The regular season is just an obstacle at this point. Once the playoffs roll around, Andy brings out the big guns from the playbook and we flip the switch. Don't know how many times it has to happen for people to understand it, but I get it.
Think about where we were last year compared to this year at this time. Pretty safe to say, as the old CP saying goes, we'll be fine. I would hate to be a person who can't convince themselves otherwise after everything we've seen. You're really not soaking this in as much as you should be if that's the case, and you also might not quite understand exactly what it is you're watching.
Yeah, there's just zero stress to the regular season.... hell, they've yet played a game this year like the Broncos or Raiders losses last season, where the only thing keeping me from watching is knowing they could always pull their heads out of their asses. Those games are painfully boring and frustrating in the sense of wasting 3 hours watching it, but still. [Reply]
Originally Posted by O.city:
The whole "they're getting everyone's best shot" thing seems a bit overblown to me. In a 17 game season.....everyone plays every week like that.
Yeah, I think it was more relevant a few years ago, but still does exist... teams would go for it on 4th down more often against the Chiefs, or the occasional onside kick surprise, etc. More and more teams are being aggressive with 4th and short though.
OTOH, no team is going to mail it in agains the Chiefs unless they get down a few scores... we know all too well the Chiefs mail it in sometimes and can play like shit for 3 quarters and still win. The Chiefs almost never get the advantage of another team being unfocused or a step slow.
And they're also not playing the Panthers every week, either... they're in hard hitting, intense rivalrly games more often than not, where as it's far easier to get up for your one game against the Chiefs. [Reply]
