Predicting national narratives for each of KC Chiefs biggest games in 2022

“Defending Super Bowl Champion Rams visit Arrowhead Stadium to reignite the I-70 rivalry.” 

The I-70 Series in 1985 opened up Pandora’s Box for a cross-Missouri sports rivalry that none of us really knew we needed. Even when the Rams were in St. Louis, the Chiefs sparingly played them – every 4 years, and in most preseasons. But there was a sense of contention that loomed over the two franchises all the way up until cartoon villain Stan Kroenke up and moved the Rams from the Gateway City to Los Angeles.

This one is a grudge match for Chiefs fans. Not only do we want to avenge the Monday Night Classic from 2018 and show out on a national stage against a team that is a former in-state barometer for success (or failure), the aftertaste of not winning Super Bowl 56 is something that the Chiefs and the Kingdom have not been able to shake since losing to the Bengals (next slide) in the 2021 AFC Championship game.

But how much love do we expect the national media to give the Chiefs in this one? It depends on how many games they’ve won to this point – specifically how many in a row. Between the Buffalo game and the Rams game, the Chiefs face the 49ers, have a bye, then take on the Jags at home and travel to LA to face the Chargers for the second time. Say the Trey Lance era isn’t going so hot. Say the Jags are who we think they are – bad. And say the Chargers game goes similar to last year’s thriller in LA. The Chiefs could be riding a wave of 7 consecutive wins coming into this matchup.

Or they could be 7-4 or 6-5, fighting for their lives to get back into the divisional hunt and scrapping for wild card position. Either way, the glitz and glam of the Rams and the way they’ve constructed their roster will likely overshadow anything the Chiefs have mustered, unless they’re just beating the doors off of the rest of the league at that point in the year.