Good news: The Giants have finally welcomed the Kansas City player with the most touchdown passes
Even though New York Giants fans had a fantastic season in 2022, it’s bittersweet to see two other teams go to the Super Bowl. Both the Philadelphia Eagles and the Kansas City Chiefs are frequent contenders and have recently won Super Bowls. These clubs and the young, moderately skilled Giants appear to be very different from one another. However, this was not always the case for the Chiefs or the Eagles. To determine whether there are any similarities or lessons for the Giants, let’s examine the construction of the two conference champion teams. We’ll look at the Chiefs’ ascent to prominence in this article.
Hire the best general manager and then the best head coach? Not always
As the only AFL team to win a Super Bowl and a founding member of the league, Kansas City was a proudly historic franchise. But they had lost their way by 1998, the final season of Marty Schottenheimer’s tenure as head coach. Six head coaches were employed by the Chiefs during a 15-year span, from 1998 to 2012. They only ever advanced past the Divisional Round in their three playoff appearances. In nine years, they had two 2-14 and two 4-12 seasons with losing records. Pretty awful, but not nearly as terrible as the Giants, who have had five head coaches in eight years.
Eventually, in 2013, Andy Reid was hired as head coach by Chiefs owner Clark Hunt, a decision that drastically altered the team’s trajectory. Over Reid’s ten years in charge, Kansas City has won three Super Bowls, advanced to the postseason nine times, participated in five AFC Championship Games, and finished with a winning record each year (with a second appearance possible this Sunday).
Kansas City leapt after Reid’s dismissal as the Eagles’ head coach a few days prior. Great decision by Scott Pioli, general manager of Kansas City, isn’t it? Not exactly, though. These are two tweets dated January 4, 2013, the second from almost two hours later:
