This Moment of Mahomes

That walkin' talkin' pass-throwin' 

paradigm shiftin' and now

bank-breakin' QB

(Photo unattributed, but thought to be Kansas City Star)

Copyright © 2020

by Ralph F. Couey

No Chiefs fan will ever forget the moment.  Super Bowl LIV, fourth quarter, about seven minutes left.  Chiefs down by 10, and 49ers fans full of gleeful anticipation.  Patrick Mahomes had thrown his second interception capping a distinctly underwhelming performance to that point.  Then, came the Jet Chip Wasp, that audacious play that changed the trajectory of the game, and of NFL history.  Seven minutes and 21 points later, a half-century of football misery was forever ended in Kansas City.

And yet, none of us were all that surprised, or even nervous.  We had already seen our quarterback lead this team from a 24-point deficit to a 51-7 run and a win in the divisional round.  In the AFC Championship game, he did it again, this time from being down 10 points twice and 17 points another time, a scintillating victory that opened the gates to Miami.  We had learned that with #15 behind center, no game was ever truly lost.  

Now, I am enough of a fan to know that this kind of thing doesn't happen in a vacuum.  In order to make those comebacks happen, the rest of the offense, and the defense and special teams had to step up and play heroically, which they did.  But it is impossible to overstate the impact that Patrick Mahomes II had on those events.  His renown goes beyond just football.  To find a similar kind of epic splash made by a young athlete, you have to go back to Babe Ruth or Joe DiMaggio, Michael Jordan, or Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.  These are athletes that changed the very nature of the games they played, and elevated the expectations forever.

Now, with just two full seasons as a starter under his belt, with a Super Bowl win and two MVP awards, this young man has been rewarded with the largest contract in sports history:  12 years, $503 million.

In this age of mega-numbers, it's still hard to wrap one's head around the size of that payday.  If you were to stack 503 million one-dollar bills, it would tower almost 34 miles high and weigh five and a half tons.  How it changes the pay structure of sport will likely have to wait for the next contracts for the other amazing quarterbacks, namely Deshaun Watson of Houston and Lamar Jackson of Baltimore, when their time comes up.  

Clearly this is a lot of cash, and there are many who would seriously question whether one person was worth that much money.  But ask any Chiefs fan, and the reply would be:  "W.E.P. -- Worth Every Penny."  To understand our position on this matter requires a shared empathy with the excruciatingly painful playoff history of this team.  Blown leads, incredibly unbelievable sequences of events...a half century of crushed hopes.  A medical examiner could identify a Chiefs fan on their table by the callous around the heart.

There's no denying or understating Mahomes' ability to do incredible things, helped by a stellar supporting cast like Travis Kelce, Tyreek Hill, Sammy Watkins, Damien Williams and others.  Add the first running back taken in this year's draft, Clyde Edwards-Helaire to that list of weapons, and you can't help but salivate.  

That is, if there is a season this year.

The dark specter of the Corona Virus Pandemic lurks over every sport.  Baseball will try to play a shortened 60-game season, MLS is back on the field, and if the NFL plays this year, it is likely to be, like the other sports, in front of empty stadiums.  It's hard to contemplate that.  Players readily admit getting energy from the roar of the crowds, especially in Kansas City, where the fans work very effectively against the attention span of the opposing team.  But if that is what we have to work with, then I guess that's the way it'll be.  Until a reliable vaccine is developed for the virus, nobody is going to be gathering in large numbers anywhere.

This turn of events will be hard to take.  Chiefs fans, the players, and nearly all of the experts agree that it's tough to imagine this team NOT repeating as Super Bowl champs, in fact, perhaps beginning a Yankee-like dynasty.  But if somehow the worst happens and the 2020 season goes away (and the infection numbers seem to suggest this thing is beginning to spin completely out of control) we'll be left with the aching memory of what might have been.

As the peerless KC Star columnist Sam Mellinger would say, "It would be the Chiefiest thing that could happen."

I remember talking to an old-timer in a Vegas casino a number of years ago who had grown up in New York, the son of a well-to-do man who took him to a lot of Yankee games.  He spoke in poetic terms about the grace and power of Joe DiMaggio; the speed, the bat, the glove, the effortlessly way he moved in the field and around the bases.  And the many times he could pick the entire team up on his broad shoulders and carry them to victory.  I remember he said, "Mantle was great.  But he was no DiMaggio.  There'll never be another Joe."  

Sometimes the ability to be able to watch a transcendent talent at work, like a Jordan, or a Tiger, or a Beckham in real time can be forgotten in the press of the moment.  But we are always in the presence of history, and we need to take the moment to treasure those opportunities.  I remember watching a World Series game on our black-and-white TV, and seeing Mickey Mantle stand in against Sandy Koufax.  I wish now that I had honored that moment with more awareness of the historicity of that encounter.  Watching Patrick Mahomes the past two seasons, I have been aware of what I've been seeing.  If I'm around 20 years from now, I can say with pride that I saw Mahomes in his prime.  My son will be bragging to his grandchildren that "there'll never be another Mahomes."  Perhaps we are watching the DiMaggio of this generation.

Nobody knows how the future is going to work itself out.  There are too many variables to address, and if you doubt that, think back just one year ago and ask yourself if you could have predicted our current situation.  So, while we could blithely say that there are multiple Super Bowl wins in the future for this quarterback and this team.  We could also predict a Joe Theisman style injury in the future that would end a certain career.  When the Patriots first drafted Tom Brady, who could have predicted that this beardless backup would eventually dominate pro football for nearly two decades?

There's simply too much uncertainty to say with any degree of assuredness what the future will bring.  In a way, we're all passengers on a train heading into a dark tunnel.  The only way we'll know how this all comes out is to wait and watch for the end of the journey.

And Pandemic or no Pandemic, football or no football, asteroid or no asteroid, it's guaranteed to be a wild ride.  Hang on tight!