The Kansas City Chiefs’ run of dominance officially hit a wall-and it’s not just current players feeling the sting. Even former stars are speaking out, as the franchise faces its first real reckoning in nearly a decade.
For seven straight seasons, the Chiefs were a fixture in the AFC Championship Game. From 2018 through 2024, Patrick Mahomes led one of the most consistent dynasties in modern football.
But now, with Kansas City sitting at 6-8 and Mahomes sidelined by a torn ACL-the first major injury of his career-the dynasty has come to a screeching halt. For the first time in the Mahomes era, the Chiefs won’t be playing football in January.
And that reality is hitting hard. Not just for fans, but for players past and present.
One of those former players is Tyrann Mathieu, the Honey Badger himself. A three-time First-Team All-Pro and one of the emotional leaders of the Chiefs' early championship teams, Mathieu opened up recently about the pain he felt when Kansas City let him go. In a conversation with Ari Meirov, Mathieu didn’t hold back.
“That really bothered me,” he said. “It stuck on me for over a year.
When I first signed with the Saints, I missed the first 7-8 days of camp. That was me looking in the mirror saying, ‘What is going on?
What did I do wrong?’ I couldn’t understand it.
I never thought I would leave Kansas City. It took me a while to get over that, actually.”
Mathieu joined the Chiefs in 2019 and immediately made an impact. That season, he earned First-Team All-Pro honors and helped lead Kansas City to a Super Bowl title-the franchise’s first in 50 years.
He followed it up with another All-Pro nod and a Pro Bowl selection in 2020, though the Chiefs fell short in the Super Bowl that year. In 2021, he made the Pro Bowl again, but Kansas City’s season ended in the AFC Championship.
Then came the surprise. Despite his production and leadership, the Chiefs didn’t offer him a new contract.
Instead, Mathieu signed with the New Orleans Saints-his hometown team-and played out the final three years of his career there, from 2022 to 2024. But while the homecoming had its emotional perks, the Saints weren’t contenders, and Mathieu missed out on two more Chiefs Super Bowl runs.
Now, with Kansas City staring down the reality of a missed postseason and Mahomes facing a long recovery, Mathieu’s comments add another layer to the emotional unraveling of a once-unshakable dynasty.
There’s no sugarcoating it-this is uncharted territory for Chiefs fans. They’ve grown accustomed to winning, to watching Mahomes pull off the impossible, to seeing their team play deep into January every year. Now, they’re facing not only the end of a playoff streak, but the possibility that their golden era might truly be in the rearview mirror.
And hearing a beloved former player like Mathieu talk about how his exit was handled? That’s salt in the wound.
This isn’t just about missed games or lost seasons. It’s about identity.
For nearly a decade, the Chiefs weren’t just good-they were the standard. Now, they’re just another team trying to find their way without their superstar quarterback and with questions piling up about what comes next.
The dynasty may be over. And for Kansas City, the fall from the mountaintop is proving to be just as emotional as the climb.