Droppin’ Dimes: Reminding NFL fans of football’s Evil Empire

Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce celebrates after the Chiefs defeated the Buffalo Bills in the AFC Championship NFL football game, Sunday, Jan. 26, 2025, in Kansas City, Mo. (AP Photo/Charlie Riedel)
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Over the past couple of years, Patrick Mahomes and the Kansas City Chiefs have had a strangle hold on the NFL. Kansas City has appeared in the AFC Championship in each of the last seven seasons with Patrick Mahomes as its starting quarterback. Of those seven appearances, the Chiefs have gone on to the Super Bowl five times, bringing the Lombardi trophy home in three of those games. They have the opportunity to earn their fourth in less than two weeks at Super Bowl 59 in New Orleans.  

And the fans are sick of it.  

NFL fans have been in anguish, having to cope with the fact that yet again, the Chiefs have the opportunity to bring home the most prestigious award in football. But the Chiefs winning is not the primary factor in the fans’ grief. Many fans complain that the Chiefs get special treatment from the referees, claiming that several key calls have kept them in games, allowing their dynasty to persist. Some have even gone as far as to say that the NFL is rigged for the Chiefs to win the Super Bowl. Mahomes has taken criticism for flopping and playing a soft brand of football. Off the field, fans also grew annoyed with how frequently Travis Kelce’s relationship with pop star Taylor Swift was featured during games and in news coverage.  

Whether these claims are true or not, the fans are livid, which has led to many reflecting on the NFL’s last dynasty, the New England Patriots. From 2001-2019, Tom Brady and the Patriots appeared in 13 AFC Championships, advanced to nine Super Bowls and won six.  

Fans have taken to social media proclaiming that they would much rather be watching the Patriots’ dynasty over the Chiefs’. Some say that, even though they were rooting against New England, they still respected them.  

“I speak for every American outside of Kansas City in apologizing to the New England Patriots and their fans. Your dynasty really wasn’t all that insufferable compared to this” claimed X user @DWStraka49.  

I will not stand for this.  

Never would I have thought it possible that everyone could suddenly forget how hated the Patriots were for the better part of two decades. But Brady is now a commentator for Fox Sports, while Julian Edleman and Rob Gronkowski have started their podcast “Dudes on Dudes with Gronk and Jules.” These villains of the early 21^st century have disguised themselves as regular people, just like you and me. All the while, a new heel has risen, taking the heat off the former tyrants of football. 

To say that an organization was only successful because of a few calls is simply not fair. Bad calls are always going to be a variable in sports, as they happen to every team and there is not much either team can do about it. Nonetheless, everyone has a favorite bad officiating moment with the Patriots.  

Some may point to Kelvin Benjamin’s overturned touchdown or marking Jesse James’ short, but none stand out more than The Tuck Rule.  

NFL Rule 3, Section 22, Article 2, Note 2 states that when a passer’s arm moves forward intentionally, it constitutes a forward pass, even if he loses possession while attempting to tuck the ball back into his body. The rule adds, “if the player has tucked the ball into his body and then loses possession, it is a fumble.” 

In the 2002 AFC divisional playoff game, Tom Brady dropped back to pass late in the fourth quarter with the Patriots trailing the Oakland Raiders by three. With no open receivers, he brought down his reared back throwing arm back to his chest, tucking the ball before looking for his next read. 

Before that next read could be found, Charles Woodson came charging through his blindside, forcing a fumble recovered by the Raiders. With the game seemingly won, officials reviewed the play and overturned the fumble, ruling it an incomplete pass, claiming Brady was in a forward throwing motion. In the replay angle, you can see Brady has two hands on the ball and was not throwing it. The Patriots managed to tie the game on that drive and went on to win the game, and then eventually Super Bowl 36.  

One can only imagine the riots that would ensue today if this kind of call was made in favor of the Chiefs.  

Football has developed an emphasis on protecting the quarterback for well over the last decade, so this is not a phenomenon unique to Mahomes. What is interesting is when these rules started to develop. The shift began in 2008, after Tom Brady tore his ACL on a low hit from Bernard Pollard. Almost immediately, the NFL introduced a rule banning defenders from going low on quarterbacks. This led to several other rule changes that expanded roughing the passer penalties. 

Fans contended that the referees favored Brady in this new style of officiating, and that he got these calls more frequently than any other quarterback, which led people to refer to them as the “Brady Rules.”  

For a true dynasty to take shape, a lot of things need to go the team’s way. The right players, the right coaching, a couple of calls and a little bit of sheer luck are all going to play their part. People hated the Patriots, not just because they were the best, but because they were catching the breaks that their team wasn’t, no different than Kansas City does now.  

However, the blatant cheating by New England throughout its reign of terror is what set the fans’ hatred for them apart from all the rest. The Patriots were a part of not one, but two of the biggest cheating scandals in league history.  

In 2007, the Spygate scandal took the NFL and football fans alike by surprise. The Patriots were accused of filming New York Jet’s defensive coaches signals from an unauthorized location. During the investigation, the Patriots were told to turn over any tapes and notes that had to do with other teams’ defensive signals. The Patriots refused. NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell dispatched league officials to go to the facility and destroy the contraband.  

The Patriots faced several consequences, including a $500,000 fine for head coach Bill Belichick, as well as the loss of the team’s 2008 first-round draft pick.  

Just a few short years later, the Patriots were right back in hot water. In the 2014 AFC Championship game, the Indianapolis Colts were trounced by the Patriots by a whopping 45-7 final score. It was later alleged that Brady was ordering the team staff to lower the air pressure in the game balls to make them easier to throw. Video footage showed an equipment manager taking the game balls into a bathroom for 90 seconds before returning them. Brady, of course, denied the claims that he was involved.  

The investigation eventually led to the NFL determining that there was “substantial and credible evidence” that Tom Brady was aware of the actions taken by the staff members to deflate the ball.  After several court appeals and an entire NFL season passed, the Patriots organization were fined $1 million and lost rights to two draft picks in 2016. As for the alleged conspirator, Brady was dealt a four-game suspension.  

Tom Brady returned from suspension in week five of the 2016 season, and the Patriots turned around and won another Super Bowl, completing the greatest comeback in football history against the Atlanta Falcons in Super Bowl 51. Infuriating. 

Nostalgia is quite the mirage, and in no time, it will look fondly on this Chiefs run in the same way it has the Patriots. But far too many people went through the grueling arguments at the office water cooler or school lunch table to allow a pop star and some bad commercials to make us forget the suffering New England caused football fans.

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