April 8, 2026 8:35 PM PDT
It is still the scariest story in football because it inevitably ends with crushed dreams. and the offense stand in the way of everyone and everything daring to dream of Super Bowl glory. It has been that way for the past five years, and it is that way still. Forget the carele s talk of a "down" year after six regular-season lo ses. Those numbers dont matter.Sure, out of the four teams remaining with ring ceremony aspirations, Kansas City has the most interceptions, the fewest pa sing yards by attempt, the fewest total touchdowns, the second-fewest pa sing touchdowns, and the second-fewest pa sing yards.Are those figures supposed to ease the tortured sensibilities of fans, who can wallow in "wide right" agony forever if they wish, but know deep down that they lost again because Mahomes and company found a way to be marginally better than and his crew, like they always do this time of year?ADVERTISEMENT Mahomes is the most Cade Marlowe Jersey destructive force in modern football, inflicting postseason pain wherever he goes. Bills supporters ultimately didnt know whether to cry because of Mahomes or to throw snowballs in his direction at Highmark Stadium. They wound up doing both.Yet while it is those from Western New York who have suffered most frequently and most gallingly at his hands, theirs is not a lonely fate. The Chiefs prolonged stretch six consecutive AFC Championship game appearances and counting has many victims, cutting off all kinds of aspirations; big or small, foolishly confident or with nervous fingers cro sed.Winning 13 out of 16 playoff games required the cold-blooded ability to perform when it matters the most. All those opportunities taken by the Chiefs mean an equal number of chances snuffed out for someone else.All those moments when, for the other team and the other QB, it was supposed to be destiny, the chance of a lifetime. Finally their time, perhaps. Until it wasnt.What went wrong for Josh Allen and the Buffalo Bills in crushing lo s to Chiefs? Mahomes understands the pain, but hes happy it belongs elsewhere."It is tough; you put in so much effort and work every single game to play in these playoff games," Mahomes told reporters on Sunday. "(Josh) played his tail off, we were just able to come out with the win in the end."Dont just ask Allen how this feels. Ask , who played a , but couldnt get the over the line. Ask an extraordinarily well-rounded team that led until late in before being suddenly overwhelmed by big play after big play.The Chiefs ruined both first playoff game just over a week ago and last game five years back. What could have been transcendent breakthroughs for , and faded into fiction.Next in Mahomes' sights: and the , who will have the twin benefits of real momentum and home field, and the whopping disadvantage of, you know, having a Mahomes-sized obstacle in their path.Have Lamar Jackson, Baltimore Ravens finally solved their playoff woes? FOX NFL analyst and Super Bowl XVIII champion Howie Long got some insight into the Mahomes mindset when his son , an offensive guard, spent time with the Chiefs in 2021."Kyle was blown away by Patrick and felt like Patrick was the closest thing in the NFL to Michael Jordan, in terms of his competitive nature and physical and his die to try to win approach," Long said on "First Things First" last week.Basketball is a different sport and different factors at play, but one thing thats similar to Jordan is the effect that the Chiefs gluttony has had on the careers of others. Just as the shut out the light for other Eastern Conference teams for what seemed like forever, Mahomes and the Chiefs are doing the same thing in the AFC.People have previously talked about as the kind of QB that youd figure would one day win a Super Bowl. The way things are going, he might not win the division he shares with Mahomes.Lawrence gets the same sort of props, and if keeps up his first-year excellence, hell join that chatter as well. But its just not that simple.Clinching a Super Bowl is monumentally hard in any era, but in this one, with Mahomes Mountain sitting real and present, it feels like a forlorn hope.Acro s those 16 playoff games, Mahomes has pa sed for 4,561 yards and notched 38 touchdowns. In the postseason, when things supposedly get tougher, he performs even better than normal. Patrick Mahomes remains gold standard in rivalry with Josh Allen after epic showdown At 28, he is already tied for the seventh-most playoff wins of all time, level with Brett Favre and , and ahead of . Of those three defeats, two came against teams led by , the only other being on the back of a wild comeback.As football fans, we have a habit of sensing that things must even out eventually. That all things good or dominant must come to an end. The teams that have come close, like the Bills, will eventually find a way to figure it out. Maybe thats not the way this tale goes.Mahomes continues to write his narrative to his liking. For everyone else, its a horror story.Martin Rogers is a columnist for FOX Sports and the author of the FOX Sports Insider newsletter. Follow him on Twitter @MRogersFOX and subscribe to the daily newsletter. Justus Sheffield Jersey
It is still the scariest story in football because it inevitably ends with crushed dreams. and the offense stand in the way of everyone and everything daring to dream of Super Bowl glory. It has been that way for the past five years, and it is that way still. Forget the carele s talk of a "down" year after six regular-season lo ses. Those numbers dont matter.Sure, out of the four teams remaining with ring ceremony aspirations, Kansas City has the most interceptions, the fewest pa sing yards by attempt, the fewest total touchdowns, the second-fewest pa sing touchdowns, and the second-fewest pa sing yards.Are those figures supposed to ease the tortured sensibilities of fans, who can wallow in "wide right" agony forever if they wish, but know deep down that they lost again because Mahomes and company found a way to be marginally better than and his crew, like they always do this time of year?ADVERTISEMENT Mahomes is the most Cade Marlowe Jersey destructive force in modern football, inflicting postseason pain wherever he goes. Bills supporters ultimately didnt know whether to cry because of Mahomes or to throw snowballs in his direction at Highmark Stadium. They wound up doing both.Yet while it is those from Western New York who have suffered most frequently and most gallingly at his hands, theirs is not a lonely fate. The Chiefs prolonged stretch six consecutive AFC Championship game appearances and counting has many victims, cutting off all kinds of aspirations; big or small, foolishly confident or with nervous fingers cro sed.Winning 13 out of 16 playoff games required the cold-blooded ability to perform when it matters the most. All those opportunities taken by the Chiefs mean an equal number of chances snuffed out for someone else.All those moments when, for the other team and the other QB, it was supposed to be destiny, the chance of a lifetime. Finally their time, perhaps. Until it wasnt.What went wrong for Josh Allen and the Buffalo Bills in crushing lo s to Chiefs? Mahomes understands the pain, but hes happy it belongs elsewhere."It is tough; you put in so much effort and work every single game to play in these playoff games," Mahomes told reporters on Sunday. "(Josh) played his tail off, we were just able to come out with the win in the end."Dont just ask Allen how this feels. Ask , who played a , but couldnt get the over the line. Ask an extraordinarily well-rounded team that led until late in before being suddenly overwhelmed by big play after big play.The Chiefs ruined both first playoff game just over a week ago and last game five years back. What could have been transcendent breakthroughs for , and faded into fiction.Next in Mahomes' sights: and the , who will have the twin benefits of real momentum and home field, and the whopping disadvantage of, you know, having a Mahomes-sized obstacle in their path.Have Lamar Jackson, Baltimore Ravens finally solved their playoff woes? FOX NFL analyst and Super Bowl XVIII champion Howie Long got some insight into the Mahomes mindset when his son , an offensive guard, spent time with the Chiefs in 2021."Kyle was blown away by Patrick and felt like Patrick was the closest thing in the NFL to Michael Jordan, in terms of his competitive nature and physical and his die to try to win approach," Long said on "First Things First" last week.Basketball is a different sport and different factors at play, but one thing thats similar to Jordan is the effect that the Chiefs gluttony has had on the careers of others. Just as the shut out the light for other Eastern Conference teams for what seemed like forever, Mahomes and the Chiefs are doing the same thing in the AFC.People have previously talked about as the kind of QB that youd figure would one day win a Super Bowl. The way things are going, he might not win the division he shares with Mahomes.Lawrence gets the same sort of props, and if keeps up his first-year excellence, hell join that chatter as well. But its just not that simple.Clinching a Super Bowl is monumentally hard in any era, but in this one, with Mahomes Mountain sitting real and present, it feels like a forlorn hope.Acro s those 16 playoff games, Mahomes has pa sed for 4,561 yards and notched 38 touchdowns. In the postseason, when things supposedly get tougher, he performs even better than normal. Patrick Mahomes remains gold standard in rivalry with Josh Allen after epic showdown At 28, he is already tied for the seventh-most playoff wins of all time, level with Brett Favre and , and ahead of . Of those three defeats, two came against teams led by , the only other being on the back of a wild comeback.As football fans, we have a habit of sensing that things must even out eventually. That all things good or dominant must come to an end. The teams that have come close, like the Bills, will eventually find a way to figure it out. Maybe thats not the way this tale goes.Mahomes continues to write his narrative to his liking. For everyone else, its a horror story.Martin Rogers is a columnist for FOX Sports and the author of the FOX Sports Insider newsletter. Follow him on Twitter @MRogersFOX and subscribe to the daily newsletter. Justus Sheffield Jersey