I remember the day and time I became a fan of the Kansas City Chiefs. It wasn’t when I was younger, growing up in a household and family that had been fans of the Chiefs for generations. It wasn’t in high school, where during my senior year they came back from a 1-5 season start to make it to the divisional round of the playoffs. It wasn’t when Andy Reid was brought in, it wasn’t when an aging Jamaal Charles cost me the championship in the church fantasy league finals. It was hour two of my drive back to college after a weekend at my parents. The first weekend of December in 2016 to be exact, and the Chiefs were playing the Falcons in Atlanta.
I was on my way back to Springfield and had the game playing on the radio, Mitch Holtus’ voice filling my car and mind as I passed through uneventful Oklahoma countryside. Matt Ryan had just thrown a touchdown pass to make the score 28-27 in Atlanta’s favor. With just under five minutes left, it made sense to go for two, make the Chiefs score a field goal only for a shot at overtime. I had seen the Chiefs lose quite a bit in my life, so I knew what was about to happen and had already come to terms with it. I had also never seen a miracle in football and didn’t really believe in them. I knew this was a basic 3-yard play, where either Devonta Freeman was going straight up the middle or Matt Ryan was going throw a beautiful fade to Fitz in the back-left corner of the endzone. But that’s not what happened. Matt Ryan snapped back and threw a beautiful fade to Fitz in the back-right corner of the endzone, but what happened for the next fifteen seconds is where I was wrong. What happened for the next fifteen seconds is what made me a fan of the Chiefs. The ball never made it to Fitz, but was intercepted by Eric Berry, who would take it 107 yards to the opposite endzone. One of his first games back from his life-threatening illness, in his hometown, heading towards the endzone his mom was sitting at, Eric Berry showed me my first football miracle in more then one way. This surprised me, proved me wrong and kept me watching all season.
I realized in this moment that Kansas City was special, and soon saw that miracles tend to happen a lot there. The next season Kareem Hunt set the world on fire as a rookie only because Spencer Ware was hurt in the season opener. Then this season, we all know what Patrick Mahomes did. But this moment never escaped my mind; the moment where Eric Berry exceeded my expectations and captured my heart for Kansas City for years to come.
