Dallas Morning News: The Chiefs have replaced the Cowboys as America's Team

[Hammock Parties]

Brings a tear to my eye. Almost full circle from childhood. I used to sit and read Tim at my breakfast table in Carrollton.

A (Taylor) Swift reaction: The Chiefs have replaced Cowboys as America’s Team https://t.co/Ss34ekpk2i

— Tim Cowlishaw (@TimCowlishaw) September 28, 2023

As majestically as the Cowboys soar when they pocket a couple of victories to start a season, a loss in Arizona mandates an equally spectacular fall back to earth. That’s what has me pondering this week whether the wrong team left Dallas 60 years ago.

Aren’t the Kansas City Chiefs “America’s Team” at this point?

For those who weren’t around in 1963 (and by “around,” I mean I was migrating reluctantly from New Jersey to Dallas as an 8-year-old that summer), the Dallas Texans and Dallas Cowboys went head to head for attention at the Cotton Bowl for three seasons before the Texans packed bags and became the Kansas City Chiefs.

Many years ago Lamar Hunt bragged to me in his office that the Texans, of the upstart American Football League, actually outdrew the expansion Cowboys in those days. To which President Tex Schramm replied, “Yes, I’m sure they gave away more tickets than we sold.”

The Chiefs actually got the upper hand on the Cowboys by playing in the first Super Bowl. The name even came from Hunt, after seeing one of his kids play with a super ball. Dallas just missed the first Super Bowl by losing to Green Bay — and then Kansas City won Super Bowl IV in New Orleans before the two leagues officially merged their schedules, creating the NFC and AFC in 1970. You never would have known the Chiefs were defending champs of anything. They played in one AFC title game, losing to Buffalo in 1993, over the next 48 years.

The Cowboys, of course, played in five Super Bowls during the 1970s, winning two of them. They became unofficially branded “America’s Team” by NFL Films, a nickname that stuck for better or worse through the years as they regained their footing and won three more Lombardi Trophies in the 1990s. The Cowboys won five of the first 30 Super Bowls. They participated in 16 of 30 NFL or NFC Championship games. There was no one like them, certainly not the Chiefs who had that one uneven loss to Buffalo during Joe Montana’s career send-off to their credit.

Then a Texas Tech quarterback arrived in Kansas City. The NFL shifted on its axis. The Chiefs have played in three of the last four Super Bowls. They won two of them. Their most impressive stat, to me, is not that they have played in five straight AFC Championship games, but that they have hosted five in a row. That requires maximum effort throughout the regular season, no stumbles in order to maintain that home-field edge. Mahomes led Kansas City to 12-4, 12-4, 14-2, 12-5 and 14-3 records to keep those games in Arrowhead Stadium.

Andy Reid’s next win ties him with Tom Landry for fourth on the all-time list (250) although Reid’s winning percentage is substantially higher. Of course, Reid never had to coach an expansion team that was given no draft picks in 1960, which meant an 0-11-1 start out of the gates for Dallas.

With all this going in their favor, the Chiefs discovered the only way to blow the doors off their competition. Taylor Swift showed up in a Kansas City suite last week, standing and cheering in Chiefs’ gear along tight end Travis Kelce’s mother, and she apparently will attend the Chiefs-Jets game in New York on Sunday night.

This isn’t fair. The Cowboys used to own the dating world along with the occasional Lombardi Trophy. It started with Lance Rentzel and Joey Heatherton. That didn’t end well for reasons we won’t even dive into. More recently, you had Tony Romo with Jessica Simpson or Carrie Underwood. Does anyone recall Miles Austin and Kim Kardashian? If you blinked, you missed it, but it happened.

Now, we have rumors of young Dallas tight end Jake Ferguson dating one of the Cavinder twins of University of Miami basketball and TikTok fame. That’s a noble effort, but you don’t understand the Swifties and the phenomenon that Taylor Swift brings to the Chiefs just by showing up for a few games.

Every professional sports franchise — Cowboys included — would love to sell out their stadiums at Taylor Swift prices. When she played three straight nights at AT&T Stadium this year, resale tickets for obstructed view seats went for at least $900. Imagine attending a Cowboys game at that price and not having a clear view of Dak throwing a 2-yard pass to Luke Schoonmaker.

Mahomes is the finest quarterback of this era and will be regarded as one of the five best ever when he’s done. Kelce might already be the game’s all-time greatest tight end. Reid is sliding past Landry toward Bill Belichick on the wins chart. And now the mighty force that is Swift joins the club. It has been said that Swift already had all the teenagers and younger music lovers in her camp, then figured out how to grab their dads with two Americana-type albums (folklore and evermore, which come highly recommended by this columnist) released during the pandemic.

With Mahomes, Reid, Kelce and now the powerful Swift, the Chiefs have it all. It’s an embarrassment of riches, a marketing guru’s dream team.

The Cowboys? It’s 27 seasons and counting since that last NFC title game. Currently a very good 2-1 team that has not fixed last year’s biggest defensive issue and may have created new ones on offense with its glacial-like Texas Coast offense.

Oh yeah, I nearly forgot. The Cowboys get Chris Christie in the owner’s box.

Now tell me which one of these is America’s Team.

[BigRedChief]

Originally Posted by Hammock Parties

In a weird way the Chiefs are almost too popular now.

The Chiefs were OUR thing, and now they have to be everybody's thing. Which maybe means our thing gets a little less real and more manufactured.

But if the alternative is what happened to Brees and Rodgers, slap some more 15s on a plastic lunchbox.

No matter where this goes, we in here have a special bond. We have suffered together. Dreamed of a day when we would be champions again. Then the painful playoff losses were suffered together. Now, we get to enjoy being the best team in football with the best QB.

[chiefzilla1501]

Originally Posted by Razaele

Dallas started calling themselves that because of the idea that they had a national fan base and were the most popular team in the country.

I would guess that while we might have gained some casuals and some front-running fans nationally, with actual football fans we are less popular now than at any time in the Chiefs franchise's history.

And outside of our territory, there will still always be more reeruned Cowboys or Steelers or Packers fans wherever you go.

We had a strong base because chiefs fans are loyal, built back our base during the Alex smith years. And people just love Andy Reid. We were likeable. So we had an outstanding base to begin with.

But I don’t think you can ignore kids. We flat out have never had a marketable superstar like him. It reminds me of the golden state warriors where kids went to the courts and started chucking up shots like him. I don’t know that you can call kids casual. They may have less knowledge of the game but they’re more obsessive about following it. These kids are gonna grow up with Kansas City as a core memory. That’s on top of a franchise with an already strong base steeped in tradition.

I don’t think we’ll ever be americas team. But it’s going to be really hard to displace us as the most popular team as long as mahomes is here.

[Zap Rowsdower]

The Chiefs are the people's champion!

[mr. tegu]

Originally Posted by Razaele

Dallas started calling themselves that because of the idea that they had a national fan base and were the most popular team in the country.

I would guess that while we might have gained some casuals and some front-running fans nationally, with actual football fans we are less popular now than at any time in the Chiefs franchise's history.

And outside of our territory, there will still always be more reeruned Cowboys or Steelers or Packers fans wherever you go.

Americas team doesn’t mean current fans of teams switch their favorite team. It means casual fans and new fans root for the Chiefs, watch their games, and in general like the team and players. It means 10 year old kids in cities like Houston, Phoenix, Chicago, etc are most likely to gravitate towards the Chiefs if not wanting to associate with their home town team.

[irafreak]

If anyone questions if I'm a bandwagon fan, I'll just show em my personalized autographed card from Stephone mother******* Paige. I still have the nigerian nightmare's autographed 8x10 in the living room.
Kc has had a nice last 10 years of pro sports. Never would've guessed we'd ever see this.

[Chiefspants]

Originally Posted by Razaele

Dallas started calling themselves that because of the idea that they had a national fan base and were the most popular team in the country.

I would guess that while we might have gained some casuals and some front-running fans nationally, with actual football fans we are less popular now than at any time in the Chiefs franchise's history.

And outside of our territory, there will still always be more reeruned Cowboys or Steelers or Packers fans wherever you go.

It’s all about the future. I see more Chiefs jerseys worn by students in the middle school I teach at in Colorado than Denver jerseys. Used to be the opposite where I went to school in rural Kansas.

[kysirsoze]

Originally Posted by Razaele

Dallas started calling themselves that because of the idea that they had a national fan base and were the most popular team in the country.

I would guess that while we might have gained some casuals and some front-running fans nationally, with actual football fans we are less popular now than at any time in the Chiefs franchise's history.

And outside of our territory, there will still always be more reeruned Cowboys or Steelers or Packers fans wherever you go.

Sounds like NFL films called them that and they ran with it for marketing reasons. For most of the time since then I think the Cowboys have been more hated than loved.

[Eleazar]

Originally Posted by chiefzilla1501

I don’t think we’ll ever be americas team.

I agree.

If this lasts long enough we'll just be the Patriots, hated by everyone except the media.

[Monticore]

My friend is a raider fan and his Kid is a Chiefs fan and he actually enjoys watching the the Chiefs play and likes Mahomes , this kind of stuff would be unheard of pre Mahomes .

[SHOWTIME]

Originally Posted by Razaele

I agree.

If this lasts long enough we'll just be the Patriots, hated by everyone except the media.

There is no chance that we become the Patriots unless Andy starts illegally videotaping his opponents.

[BigRedChief]

Originally Posted by Monticore

My friend is a raider fan and his Kid is a Chiefs fan and he actually enjoys watching the the Chiefs play and likes Mahomes , this kind of stuff would be unheard of pre Mahomes .

I'm hearing it all over the USA. Elementary kids all over the USA are wanting Mahomes jerseys and becoming Chief fans despite Dad being a long time, hard core fan of another team.

[chiefzilla1501]

Originally Posted by Razaele

I agree.

If this lasts long enough we'll just be the Patriots, hated by everyone except the media.

I don’t think we’ll be the patriots. People hated them because they were unlikeable assholes. That came from a top down culture of curmudgeons who grumbled to the media and as we know made it a point to shut the public out - remember their media blackout policy? The only reason they grew is because ESPN was all over their dicks, then barstool developed an army of trolls.

We are way more Chicago bulls and golden state warriors. A really likeable team that people hate just because we’re good, but goddamn will they respect us. I know diehards from lots of teams who despises the Yankees and the patriots, but they just can’t find bad things to say about mahomes even though they badly want to.

[Macroach]

Originally Posted by chiefzilla1501

I don’t think we’ll be the patriots. People hated them because they were unlikeable assholes. That came from a top down culture of curmudgeons who grumbled to the media and as we know made it a point to shut the public out - remember their media blackout policy? The only reason they grew is because ESPN was all over their dicks, then barstool developed an army of trolls.

We are way more Chicago bulls and golden state warriors. A really likeable team that people hate just because we’re good, but goddamn will they respect us. I know diehards from lots of teams who despises the Yankees and the patriots, but they just can’t find bad things to say about mahomes even though they badly want to.

I agree with this. I am surrounded by 49er fans who "hate" the Chiefs but it's more about respect and fear, or the feeling in the back of their minds that even if they succeed on their long NFC journey to the super bowl, 15 is looming.

Mahomes just comes across as naturally likable and charming. Even the 49er fans that "hate" the concept of the Chiefs and their success admit that they admire and are envious of what we have going here.

[notorious]

It’s lonely at the top.

**** each and every last mother ****er that doesn’t love my Chiefs.

[St. Patty's Fire]

Originally Posted by RealSNR

As an out-of-area fan, people used to be really interested when I'd say I'm a Chiefs fan. They'd want to know the story. They would try to empathize when I shared my misery and frustration. At worst, I was inoffensive. At best, I was a wise soul who commanded respect.

Now? I get dirty looks. I have to explain, "No, see, I was a fan long before Mahomes got there" and that just makes it worse because people don't want to hear from a former pauper about how great their life is compared to what it was. I don't get to share anything about who I am as a fan. All I'm allowed to do is smile and admit that I'm lucky.

And then I have to come home to my man cave full of two years' worth of Super Bowl shit and stare at it and ponder the human connection that is now gone from my life and feel bad that I really actually don't ****ing give a shit, and that I'd gladly be completely ostracized by all future strangers I meet for another handful of Super Bowls and more Super Bowl shit to stare at and appreciate.

The Chief fan's burden, I tell ya...

for real its like i have to explain myself everytime i say im a chiefs fan

it’s pretty shit