Patrick Mahomes and the Kansas City Chiefs have a long way to go before their current stretch of excellence matches the New England Patriots‘ two-decade dynasty.
But Andy Reid and friends are already in the conversation with Bill Belichick’s bunch in one noticeable way:
Large, large swaths of America are actively rooting for their demise.
The Chiefs are now the most polarizing team — not just in football, but probably all of sports.
More than 50 million people tuned in to watch them beat the Buffalo Bills on Sunday, a staggering figure that shattered records for a Divisional Round playoff game.
And a large portion of that audience rooted against the defending Super Bowl champs for a bunch of different reasons.
Why Are the Kansas City Chiefs So Disliked?
Expect that to carry over to Sunday’s AFC Championship Game.
By more than a three-to-one margin, respondents to an admittedly unscientific poll question we posed on X, formerly known as Twitter, on Wednesday revealed they are rooting for the Baltimore Ravens to send the Chiefs into the offseason.
Who are you rooting for in the AFC Championship Game? And why?
— Adam Beasley (@AdamHBeasley) January 24, 2024
And the comments — which we’ll get to in a bit — were wild.
Part of the vitriol just comes with the territory.
Rico Richie said it best: “If you ain’t got no haters, you ain’t poppin’.”
Ubiquity leads to fatigue, which leads to animosity.
It happened on a grander scale to the Patriots, who over 18 years appeared in 15 Divisional Round games, 13 AFC Championship Games, and nine Super Bowls.
The Chiefs have a long way to match that insane pace, but Sunday’s game against the Ravens will be their sixth-straight conference title game appearance. They’re trying for their third Super Bowl championship in five years.
The more the Chiefs win, the more people will get sick of them — particularly in New England.
“There are only four fan bases with the right to an opinion on the Kansas City Chiefs: their fans, Taylor Swift fans, Bills fans and, where I come in, Patriots fans,” said sports talk radio host Adam Kaufman, who hosts a sports betting show on Boston’s WRKO-680 AM. “Are Pats fans threatened by the Chiefs’ success the last half-dozen years? Yes and no.”
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Kaufman has a begrudging respect for the Chiefs but certainly isn’t rooting for them this weekend.
“What’s most impressive about the Chiefs is, let’s be honest, they aren’t even all that great, and they’re still in the semis,” he added. “Now that’s where the comp gets scary for Pats fans. That was our story for more than a few years. A team that’s picked against over and over throughout the season and, at the end, they’re still there, like the boogeyman.
[Patrick] Mahomes is kind of our boogeyman right now.”
Travis Kelce and Taylor Swift: The Couple Many Love To Hate
All of this comes with the territory of greatness, but social media and culture wars have been a potent accelerant for otherwise petty grievances.
The Chiefs trigger a different kind of rage largely because of three people: Mahomes, Taylor Swift, and Travis Kelce.
Swift and Kelce are arguably the most famous couple in the country, if not the world, right now. They’re easily the most polarizing.
Swift and her legion of fans have become a big part of the NFL’s DNA — and that has infuriated the half of the country that doesn’t agree with her politics, or in some cases, mere existence.
“Sick of seeing Taylor,” one X user who voted for the Ravens responded.
“Sick of Chiefs period time for some new blood 🩸 plus Taylor Swift and Travis need some alone time,” added another.
Swift represents a changing world — and a changing NFL — that today’s Right loathes.
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Conservative polemicist Charlie Kirk, who disagrees with Swift’s left-leaning worldview, basically damned her to hell during his podcast last December.
“Someone who turns away from the faith and pursues money, fame, and approval of the world,” Kirk said. “Good luck in eternity, Taylor.”
Swift has become a target for her outspoken support of Democratic candidates and LGBTQ+ causes.
Right-wing social media personality Phillip Buchanan — who goes by the charming pen name Catturd on his two-million follower X account — said this about Swift:
“FFFF – thanks to Taylor Swift, I absolutely hate the Kansas City Chiefs now.”
In case you don’t speak sexist, FFFF is shorthand for a popular misogynistic slogan.
Swift’s pairing with Kelce, who has cut pro-COVID vaccine ads for Pfizer and shilled for right-wing pariah Bud Light, has been a force multiplier for rage.
And it’s not just people talking smack on social. Some possibly impaired fans in western New York last week said it to Kelce’s face on Sunday.
“‘I had to spread the love baby; you’ve always got to spread that love, baby,” Travis told brother Jason on their New Heights podcast this week. “There was a lot of hate pulling up to that stadium. … Understandably, it’s a football game.
“Did it get a little disrespectful? One thousand percent. I’m not going to say [what] because that’s what they want; I’m not going to relay it,” he added.
“Some things were said about the family — some pretty inappropriate things were said about Pat Mahomes. It was pretty whack. I get it, coming into a hostile environment. I just wanted them to know it isn’t mutual.
“I don’t hate you guys like you hate us. It’s all love, baby.”
It is important to note that many millions adore Swift, including those who like the pop icon and are now new football fans. Kelce was a football star before the relationship. Now, he is a cultural phenomenon.
In the short time since his relationship with Swift became public, he has added more than a million Instagram followers.
A representative voice for this cultural shift is Liz Saul, who left this comment on a LinkedIn post by PFN CEO Matt Cannata extolling the positive impact Swift has had on the league:
“For years, I have heard about the declining ratings in the NFL. How do you increase your fan base not to mention keep the ones you’ve got?
“Simple: Expand your demographic – you expand your audience. Taylor Swift did just that. The NFL, whether they like it or not, needs to embrace this moment and make it last. Taylor certainly opened the doors and created interest, how we keep it alive is on us.”
Sadly, however, the loud voices drown out the more measured ones — particularly online.
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Like Kelce, Mahomes also gets grief over with whom he chooses to spend his life.
Wife Brittany has had some high-profile cringey moments over the last couple of years, and her new friendship with Swift has people bothered too.
Plus Pat deserves some blame for his public image too. He’s not exactly a gracious loser, and his habit of constantly working the refs has given him a whiner’s reputation.
Chiefs vs. Patriots: Who’s Hated More?
Of course, Patriots Derangement Syndrome was similarly personality-based.
Belichick and Tom Brady both were villains to many, and their respective cheating scandals made the Patriots an easy target.
But social media didn’t even exist when they won their first championship, and even late in their dynasty, the level of scrutiny wasn’t what it is now.
All that being said, there is one way in which the Patriots (or at least within their fan base) will always have the edge on the Chiefs: the sense of superiority (which in this case is justified).
“The first thing a New England fan will do when this debate comes up is ask how many rings Patrick Mahomes has and whether he’s ever beaten Tom Brady in the playoffs,” Kaufman wrote to us via text. “He hasn’t, and never will.
“But, the Chiefs have been to six straight AFC title games! Cool, Pats reached eight in a row. And, over two decades, nine Super Bowls, with six wins. Brady, Bill, and the Pats were in the league’s main event, on average, every other year!
“Could Mahomes reach six? If he wins this year, that’s three and he’s only 26. Far from impossible, but still nowhere close. If you think he is, look up how many guys in NFL history have won three, let alone double that. Why are we talking about this like it’s easy?”
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