Patrick Mahomes' response to ESPN's QB rankings says more than it seems

As I was lying in bed watching the end of the ESPYs this week, I had several thoughts racing through my brain. My mind initially veered toward how I used to be a massive fan of the midsummer awards show put on by the Worldwide Leader, but that was before my NFL team actually started winning Super Bowls. Since 2019, they've been an afterthought, a marker of the heart of the dog days of the sports calendar. I then found it strange that, for the first time in a while, no Kansas City Chiefs players, nor the team in general, were up for any awards.

That thought made me sad and slightly angry. I then turned my newly inherited passive aggression toward host Marcello Hernandez, wondering out loud who actually found that guy funny as he wrapped up what was essentially a month-delayed celebration of the New York Knicks' NBA championship.

But as we sit here in the sports calendar's version of purgatory, with the FIFA World Cup wrapping up and not much else to write home about sports-wise, any time we get a small glimmer of football, we have to overreact to it. So when that same Worldwide Leader dropped a list earlier this week crafted from a survey of NFL scouts and front office members on the league's best quarterbacks that had Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes ranked No. 2 behind Buffalo Bills signal-caller Josh Allen, many ears perked up in Chiefs Kingdom. We've been watching soccer and baseball for a month; now we have some football debate back in our lives? Game on.

Is it frivolous to rank Allen ahead of Mahomes if we look at career achievement? I'll let you answer that one for yourselves, but I can advise you that a couple of simple Google searches, such as "Patrick Mahomes Super Bowl wins," "Patrick Mahomes MVPs," or "Patrick Mahomes playoff record vs. Josh Allen", would lead you down the right path. We all know it's a nonsense ranking when it comes to actual success on the field, but when we live in the 24/7 news cycle world that we do and have to be commissary visitors to all of the prisoners of the moment who dwell in today's sports media world, it's part of the risk we assume in consuming today's sports content.

Luckily, our prince takes these things in stride and handles them with the utmost grace in media communication. Mahomes himself was asked about the rankings and had this to say on Yahoo! Sports Daily:

"You understand it." No, Pat, I don't. But I know what you were really trying to say.

Underneath the calm, cool professionalism, there's a silent narrative being written. Maybe mostly by slightly-left-of-center fans like myself, but there's something bubbling under the surface. Mahomes doesn't say much in this clip and certainly doesn't provide any bulletin-board material to any of the opposing quarterbacks (or their defenses) included on the list. But to me, the "Mmmm" before he actually gets into his explanation says it all.

We are talking about a Michael Jordan-level, steal-your-soul-and-burn-down-your-village-in-the-process competitor. Ask the people of Buffalo and Baltimore. Mahomes is ruthless when it comes to winning and being the best. The slight of having him ranked behind a guy whom he has never lost to in a meaningful football game is something that is almost certainly burning inside him.

Mahomes concludes his comments with a subtle "...it's my job this year to prove why I can jump up on the list back to No. 1." That is the most subtle and professional way that Mahomes could have said what he is likely—and we are certainly all—feeling. Remove the professional paraphrasing, and the stripped-down version of this is, "Y'all are doubting me, and that's fine, but you're about to remember who the hell I am."

Maybe I'm pulling something out of thin air. Maybe this is just a professional being realistic and, well, professional when asked an objective question about subjective rankings. Maybe someone who is eight years younger than me is infinitely more mature than I am. But you know what? It's mid-July, we're still a month-plus away from training camp, and we need something to fuel our football fire. You may not have realized it would be a 33-second clip from an internet sports show, but here's your gas, Chiefs Kingdom.

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