Kansas City Chiefs
After trying to buy an NFL franchise a couple of times without success in the 1950s, the 26-year old Texan Lamar Hunt decided to go a different route: Not only did he found his own football team, the Dallas Texans that became the Kansas City Chiefs later on, he also founded his own league – the American Football League AFL.
The established NFL took on the challenge of the contender and in turn founded their own new team in Lamar Hunt’s hometown Dallas, the Dallas Cowboys. But the competition spurred Hunt additionally and he was able to make the Texans one of the top teams in the AFL from the start. With the commitment of quarterback Len Dawson, it also turned a success: In 1962, the Dallas Texans were able to defeat the Houston Oilers in the AFL Championship Game with 20:17 after two overtimes.
In order to strengthen the position of his league in the bitter struggle with the NFL, Hunt decided a little later, that it was better to move the team to a city with no direct competition. Hunt found the best conditions in Missouri and in early 1963 he moved the Texans to Kansas City. After moving to a different state, he obviously also had to change the name of the team, which was determined by a fan contest: The team was from now on called the Kansas City Chiefs.
The team also had success under the new name: In 1966, the Chiefs won another AFL championship and therefore had the honor to represent the league in Super Bowl I. The Super Bowl lost to the Green Bay Packers with 35:10, though. In 1969 they won another championship and participated in the Super Bowl, which was more successful this time: Led by quarterback Len Dawson, defensive tackle Buck Buchanan and linebacker Willie Lanier, the Chiefs defeated the Minnesota Vikings with 23:7.
The record of 92 wins, 50 defeats and 5 draws was the best record of any AFL team during the ten-year existence of the league. And Coach Hank Stram was the only coach who coached only one team throughout the decade.
In 1971, the Kansas City Chiefs won their Division, but were defeated by the Miami Doplhins – after double overtime – on Christmas Day. It should be the last playoff participation for the next 15 years. It also didn’t help the Chiefs to move to the new Arrowhead Stadium in 1972, which is one of the loudest NFL stadiums thanks to its good acoustics and is a regular challenge for the visiting team. You wll easily recognize the intense atmosphere watching Kansas City Chiefs home games online.
In the late 1980s, the success came back to Kansas City: Under Coach Marty Schottenheimer the team only had one season with more defeats than victories in ten years, and the Chiefs reached the playoffs seven times. In 1993 they reached the AFC Championship Game again, led by quarterback Joe Montana, however, the Kansas City Chiefs were defeated by the then dominant Buffalo Bills.
|