They were bad for the same reasons that so many other teams tend to stay bad for large sections of time regardless of talent. Poor GM and poor HCs. At least KC had a good owner which those other teams typically don’t have.

Ethan Horton
Brian Jozwiak
Paul Palmer.
Back to back to back. Woof

Set them back until ~2017. Because of the failure of Blackledge this team didn’t take a chance on a first round QB until Mahomes. That’s 34 years of at best treading water. While they improved during the Marty era, that never translated into championships.

Marty favored veteran QBs. Prior to his tenure I can’t really comment a whole lot bc I was too young. Obviously the 83 draft is infamous.

Firing Mackovic didn’t cost them a title but was clearly a step in the wrong direction and doing so due to a coup is asinine.

CP clearly favored veteran QBs as well as he traded for another after Marty left. CP whiffed on many a draft pick on top of that - he was a decent GM but nowhere near elite.

My read on it is CP refused to take the risk involved with trading up and trying to hit on a QB bc 10-6 playoff berths kept him employed as long as the stands were full and he was right bc that tact allowed him to milk it for 20 years give or take.

What is so remarkable is this Mahomes/Reid era has wiped out the ineptitude of the previous 50 years in an incredibly short period of time in a comparative sense as there are incredibly now only 4 franchises with more Super Bowl wins and there’s a good chance that halves shortly.

Honestly, I don't think Lamar Hunt really started caring about the Chiefs again until Jerry Jones bought the Cowboys. Lamar could not stomach another oil man in the league and in his home state of TX.

After Jones bought the Cowboys, Lamar cleaned house, brought in Carl & Marty and the rest is history as they say.

Fans loved Kenney, he was the 1st QB in years capable of big numbers in what was a RB dominated era. He had huge games with Carlos Carson (1,351 yds in '83), Henry Marshall (most all-time receptions for a Chiefs WR?) and Stephon Paige (2 seasons 900 yds, one seasom averaged about 22 yds/reception). He was a bit of a gunslinger with too many INTs, but he had to be with that defense. He had a string of injuries that diminished his careers numbers, but surely would have been remembered as more of a winner had Joe Delaney not tragically drowned. Delaney may have brought down his stats, but they would have won more games...the RBs selected after JD were utterly without pro ability.

Marty wasn't COMPLETELY wrong about a "great D and running game", as that formula workes a few times in his era (Hostettler-Giants, Rypien & Williams-Redskins), but when you combine journeymen QBs with journeymen WRs, it's almost impossible. And the Defense better be so good, they had a nickname.

The top 10 teams have won 43 of 57 SBs.

Really top heavy.

My father always said Kinney’s numbers were inflated with garbage yards playing catch up while the other team played the clock with a lead. He thought he was meh.

Undoubtedly regardless he never had adequate help.

Good point. The Chiefs were shy about drafting a QB after the Blackledge failure.

George Blowfish on line 1.

I'm too young to have witnessed it, but this is the thoughts my family always left me with. The organization did not make the transition out of the good old boys cigar club era and into the more modern management era fast enough and it set them back at least a decade. So much of the league was changing and growing during that time and anyone who was slow to react got left behind.

I personally blame Blacksludge. As I mentioned previously he was/is a grifter. Look at him in the booth. The guy is greasy and sounds like he should be selling high mileage used cars. And it was a hell of a lot more than a decade.

Disclaimer-
I have an "unhealthy" hate for the guy according to my son.

9 out of 10 times when someone fails like that it's an organization problem. Like a Bears fan could say man we took Trubisky over Mahomes, when realistically Mahomes probably isn't Mahomes if he goes there.

NA. We Actuslly started winning when we started saying LIN Elliot. Can’t forget where we came from

True but-
The guy had the talent. It was not the organization. It was his motivation. He did not give a damn about playing football. You could tell it by the way he practiced and played.

1981. You mean. 1982 we went 3-6. Strike year.

Sram? Lol He was gone way before the 80s. He was not the reason why. Wow o can see the 70s. But not the 80s

Mecca wrote something that made me think-
Organization-
As a long (long long) time fan of the Kansas City Chiefs (now living in Donk tard land)............
Sometimes I take for granted how special Andy Reid really is.
Same goes for the Hunt family.

Living thru what has been discussed in this thread- We are blessed today.

Well, u don't need George. I am old enough to remember. When I was 5 years old Jim Tyrer used to live across the street, and Fred Arbanas lived one block away. Jan Stenerud was a patient of my Dad's as well as Vince Costellio, who was the MLB for the Browns during the Jim Brown Era and was the Chiefs d-coordinator in the late 70s.

My father's medical office was also in the same building as Chiefs team doctor Jon Browne in the late 80s and through the 90s.

I've been a Chiefs fan forever.

The biggest reason the Chiefs failed in the 80s can be summed up in two words: Jim Schaaf.

He was the GM after Jack Steadman and kept the job until Carl Petersrn came in 1989. Schaaf was terrible. Just look at the drafts.

Not only did they blow the Blackledge pick (over Jim Kelly and Dan Marino, Marv Levy wanted a mobile qb and Schaaf took Steve Fuller over Joe Montana (who was quite mobile when young and had just won a national title at Notre Dame). Teams passed on Montana bc he didn't have ideal size and had a mediocre arm.

Yea. I think he just drew names out of a hat. 🎩

As someone who didn't live through the 70s and 80s, these anecdotes just confirm my beliefs for why current middling franchises are where they are - ownership and management.

Being burned by a bad QB in the first round can set you back years, but purposefully avoiding a first round QB because of that one mistake is a mindset that will set you back decades. Combine that with the list of coaches we had until we got Marty, and it all starts to make sense.

All true but I still hate Todd B.
oh and Jerry Jones says hey

I told a buddy of mine who's a Cowboys fan that franchise won't go anywhere until Jerry kicks the can.

They were certainly playing catch up most of the time, and he may have looked better due to the era, but in 1983 (his best season), he was #2 in passing yards (272 yds/game), 112 yards behind Lynn Dickey, but had 11 fewer INTs. He never matched those numbers again, and I don't think he ever played a full season due to injury. He had some are talent, especially the deep ball.

It’s already played out - all but the dying. Jerry wants to win but not at the expense of his ego.

I think Stephen and Charlotte are smarter but time will have to tell.

Help me with the reference...

His deceased Dad had season tickets that now George has from Municipal Stadium days, well over 50 years. He is a legend both at Arrowhead and here.

He has 2 tickets in front row on the 50.

George used to have a webpage where he dissed Kenny and that entire era pretty badly.

He hated that dude.

Lol...interesting. So much more to hate in that era. Pitiful line play, maybe two defensive players that you would want on your 85-man roster, their cheerleaders were plucked from Chess King, and of course the front office knew more about dividends than d-ends, but I get it.

Actually, the Chiefs had more than decent defensive talent in the 80s. Albert Lewis, Deron Cherry, Rock Ross, Lloyd Burrus might have been the best secondary in the AFC. The had some decent linebackers in Dino Hackett and Gary Spani. Art Still was a top rate DE and NT Bill Maas could play. DE Mike Bell had 10 sacks in 1984 and 13 in 1984.

Levy ran the boring ass Wing T, it was a horrible pro offense. He left here and did the K-gun thing and had a lot of success except for ya know always failing at the end.

Bill Kenney threw the best punt passes ever.

He bitched about the Bengals hurry up and got it banned for them and then stole it and used it for the Bills. Those 4 SB losses were karma IMHO.

My two cents, and I'll start by saying that I mean no offense against anyone I may be critical of. They were all Chiefs and did their best, so I respect the efforts of everyone in that era even if they didn't produce a lot of success.

The drafts in the 1970s were shockingly bad. Now, there may have been a coaching problem that exacerbated it, but I think there was a lack of talent coming in each year. This meant that we didn't have players learning from veterans, which slowed down development of young players throughout the 80s.

We certainly had some good players, but never to an extent to get critical mass. By position group, I'd suggest the following. Note that I'm not looking up any stats and am just going from memory.

Running backs. We were perpetually weak at running back, despite a few high draft picks (Tony Reed, Jeff Kinney, etc.). Delaney was the only guy who came in strong, and we know what happened there. We had too many years with journeyman lead running backs like Billy Jackson and Ted McKnight and Theotis Brown in a running-heavy era where other teams had guys like Earl Campbell and Walter Payton and Marcus Allen. Okoye arrived late in the 80s but had a short career. Grade F.

Quarterback: Believe it or not, we tried. We spent high draft picks on both Steve Fuller and Todd Blackledge in that era, and both busted. Bill Kenney had a few good years (I disagree with Blowfish on his skill level), but for the most part we had subpar talent here. Grade: D.

Wide Receiver/Tight End: Prior to the Mahomes era, I would have said this group was good. We had a few years with Carlos Carson, Stephone Paige, and Henry Marshall, but the harsh truth is that they were an average receiving corps, or only slightly above average, in their best years. We didn't have perennial stars. Walter White was really promising at tight end, but I think his career ended prematurely. Grade: C.

Offensive Line: We had good players on and off but never a powerful overall unit. Jack Rudnay was a solid but undersized center for a decade. John Alt arrived in the mid-80s, along with Irv Eatman and Mark Adickes from the USFL. But that was late in the 80s. For the most part the offensive line was weak outside of Rudnay. Grade: C-

Special Teams: We were good at finding kickers with Stenerud up to the late 70s and then Lowery in this era, and we had decent punters off and on (e.g., Jim Arnold). Our returners were typically subpar. I remember J.T. Smith being okay. Grade: B+, based mostly on the kickers.

Defensive Backs: This is the one area where we shined. Gary Green was around in the late 70s and maybe early 80s, and Gary Barbaro was a hoss at safety, one of my favorite players ever. Over time we got the Lewis/Ross/Burruss/Cherry group. Grade: A.

Linebackers: This group was really weak from the mid-70s until Derrick Thomas arrived. I remember our leading guys often being guys like Thomas Howard, Charles Jackson, Ken McAlister, and a short burst from Tim Cofield. How many people remember those guys? In a running era, linebackers were important, and we also transitioned to a 3-4 without a lot of linebacker accomplishment. Grade: F.

Defensive Line: For much of this era we had Art Still, who I think is a Hall of Fame snub. If he had gone to a strong team, he'd be a Hall of Fame guy right now. We added Bill Maas, who was pretty good, and Mike Bell, who was okay. We seldom had depth, but it was a reasonably strong unit for much of the 80s. Grade: B+, mostly due to Art Still.

Overall, my take is that we could generally field a good defense, but our linebackers were a weak spot that kept the defense from being strong enough to carry the team. And our offenses were pretty much always below average other than a couple of years of Bill Kenney throwing all over the place. Our special teams were pretty good at the skill spots, but with little offense they were hamstrung.

I blame a lot of poor drafting at offensive skill positions, weak linebackers, and often subpar offensive lines.

Good point, when I had season tickets, I tend to remember the futility of Getty, Condon, and Herkenhoff on the O-Line, Theotis Brown, James Hadnot, and Jewerl THomas at RB, Whitney Paul, Jerry Blanton, and Thomas Howard at LB who were the league's worst position group, Dino Mangiero, Dave Lindstrom, Fuzzy Kremer, and Don Parrish along the DL. Just stomach turning talent. My memory skews to the earliest years of the decade, before Mackovic's miracle playoff team that had an A+ defensive backfield, but little else!

The point remains...I could choose three CPers today who, without even getting on a plane, would conduct FAR more successful drafts than the FO of the early 80s.

-In the 1980 draft, the CHiefs selected Brad Budde, and three OLs taken after him were Pro-Bowlers, one of which was a HoFer.

-1981 the Chiefs took TE Willie Scott in the 1st: 12 Pro Bowlers, and 4 HoFers went after Scott in the 1st 3 rnds. Scott's entire career was an off-year by Kelce standards (89 receps, 766 yds).

-1982 the Chiefs took WR Anthony Hancock who played 5 yrs in KC and had a slightly more productive career (73 rec, 1266 yds), but the Chiefs missed on 6 Pro Bowlers, 2 of whom were WRs.

-1983- we all know that painful story. In the 1st 2 rnds alone, there were 23 Pro Bowlers and 7 HoFers, none of which the Chiefs got. Without trading up, the Chiefs could still have changed their fortune by taking Marino or Kelly.

Boys, consider yourselves blessed...bumbling, stumbling Front Offices still exist, but the current Chiefs have built a winning DNA of sorts, and I think we are in for a few more decades of good football. We may have a few lean years here and there, and a disappointing HC hire after Andy, but I'm confident we will never be in the position of praying that Tyler Thigpen starts over Brody Croyle.

That and Todd Hayley told him to **** himself.

This past Sunday I was flying out of ORD to State College PA.

Son and I board the plane and about 10min into the flight I notice the guy one row in front to the left that looks like Blacksludge. I start shaking my head and my kid asks me whats wrong. I say I am 99% sure that is Blacksludge. We land. Son confirms it is Blacksludge and advises me me not to make a scene. It was Easter so I decided to take the higher road. I did walk by him with a Chiefs cap on, looked at him and shook my head in disapproval.

Oh and he walks like he has 2 bad hips, 2 bad knees and his ankles are jacked. Kind of Pigeon toed like Elway.

Our secondary wasn't good, it was GREAT.
Best in the league.

We had a shit offense, shit QBs and shit coaching for the most part.

Gary Barbaro and Art Still were great but wasted.

Steve Fuller and Bill Kenney sucked moosecock.