Withdrawal
By author
My name is Nick Rodgers, and I am an Addict.
To be specific, I am an Arrowhead Addict. I have spent my entire life injecting my mind with Kansas City Chiefs information, and getting high on Red and Gold fumes to enhance my life. Despite the long off seasons there is always that enticing trickle of Chiefs information available to get by until the next score, like the last resin hit out of your favorite bong. No matter how desperate the times or how barren the Chiefs World seemed, there was always something: contract negotiations, trade offers, rumors, workouts, rookie signings, free agency etc. Right now there is nothing. We continue to talk to each other to keep our minds sane like acid fiends trying to decide exactly what color music is, but really this is merely a distraction from the fact that we as fans are in fact locked out from the NFL as well. We are locked out, and I for one have entered the stages of withdrawal.
I am not presupposing that everyone is exactly like me and that the feeling of total separation from the Kansas City Chiefs is as severe with you as it is with me. I understand that there are varying degrees of addiction, and that while some people functioned normally during prohibition others jumped out of windows.* I just feel right now like the NFL draft was that last shot of methadone Paddy and Big Matt administered to me in white coats saying, “You will experience cold chills, shakes, and upset stomach but you are on the road to recovery.”
*May not be a historical fact, actually if it is it’s merely coincidence because I just made it up.
Right now I don’t want recovery.
I want to binge on the rhetorical Rubik’s cube of Todd Haley’s press conference rhetoric. I want to fly high off the smoke of Pioli’s “Right 53.” I want to imbibe an entire preseason of debauchery and get into fights with my best Arrowhead Addict friends, then have the round of apologies that always follows periods of overindulgence. Cross-eyed and stumbling, I want to repeat over and over again why this is the team that is going to finally win a Super Bowl for Kansas City to a group of girl scouts who unfortunately rang my doorbell trying to sell cookies (sorry Troop 127). I want more. I want more.
Those of you that follow my posts will remember that I put up a petition to boycott the NFL a while ago in the event that their labor dispute resulted in lost games for the upcoming season. Thank you to the 35 other people that joined in the cause. Unfortunately it looks like we may fall a little short of our goal of 5,000 signatures. My brother gave me shit last week when I was up there because I was wearing a 2010 AFC West Division Champs T-shirt and asked how my boycott was going. I still hold true that I will not participate in any direct revenue generating channels for the NFL in the case aforementioned, but it doesn’t mean it will be easy. The Chiefs are a major part of my life, and really I could care less about the NFL if the Chiefs weren’t part of it. If the Chiefs moved to another city I wouldn’t watch nearly as much football as I do now if any. When I say I am an Arrowhead Addict that is exactly what I am. I bleed Red and Gold, and that’s a direct result of how much of it I have ingested.
My point here is that I am committed to 12 months without football if within the NFL greed prevails and darkness ensues, but it’s been a hard enough off season as it is. You can only clean your house so many times waiting for the phone call that the fix is in before you decide that you don’t need the fix anymore, and my tile grout is immaculate along with the vents from my furnace, the dust from the ceiling fans, my closets, my basement, and the exterior of my house. Hurry up NFL; make a move before your Addicts go from withdrawal into recovery. Time is running out before we realize that we don’t need you to survive.