Bills-Chiefs: Rivalry or Abuse?

It’s one thing to be the plucky underdog. It’s something else altogether to be in an abusive relationship. The Bills-Chiefs thing—let’s just say it’s crossed the line.

Back in 1967, the Buffalo Bills were one game away from playing in what would later be labeled as Super Bowl I. The game was in Buffalo, but simple geography wasn’t enough to prevent a 31-7 thrashing at the hands of their opponent, a squad from a midwestern city called Kansas City. The Chiefs would lose in that Super Bowl, but three years later, they would go on to win it all.

By the 1970s, the Bills had the good fortune of landing a generational running back. Unfortunately, he ended up with a few legal troubles. No big deal—you know the O.J. Simpson story.

What was a big deal was the Bills appearing in four straight Super Bowls in the 1990s. In two of those years—one which included a rival named Joe Montana—they took down the Chiefs in the playoffs on the way to the promised land. The promised land, of course, proved to be an inferno—the Bills lost all four Super Bowls and have yet to return. If you’re keeping track, that makes their record in the big game 0-4.

While all this was going on, the city of Buffalo was bleeding. The population had peaked in 1950 at 580,132, and as the Bills were losing championships, that number dropped under 300,000, lingering there to this day (January 22, 2025).

Along the way, an entire NBA team picked up and left for California.

The city’s other remaining major sports team—the Buffalo Sabres of the NHL—has never won the Stanley Cup. In fact, not having made the playoffs since the 2010-2011 season, the Sabres are tied for the longest active playoff drought in the four major North American sports.

For unknown reasons, in 2010, I moved to Western New York with my family, thereby making these stories my own.

Meanwhile, in Kansas City, things were just fine—in that middle-America sort of way.

After the Chiefs won their first Super Bowl, success continued to slowly trickle in. The city’s baseball team—the Kansas City Royals—won a couple World Series. KC even added a major sports team—something to do with soccer—that has itself won a couple championships.

The city is at peak population (508,090) and anchors a metro area that exceeds 2.3 million, more than twice the size of the Buffalo region.

The latter promotes itself via the chicken wing, the Goo Goo Dolls, and a company called New Era that apparently makes baseball caps.

KC, on the other hand, boasts one of the world’s best barbecue scenes, a key slice of jazz history and Janelle Monáe, and around five Fortune 1000 companies.

And all that, by the way, is just the backdrop of this tale.

The Bills-Chiefs story really started in 2017, when the Chiefs drafted a quarterback named Patrick Mahomes. The Bills could have had him, but they opted instead to trade their pick with the folks from Kansas City.

That disaster was somewhat mitigated in the following year’s draft when the Bills found a guy in Wyoming named Josh Allen to throw the ball for them.

Both quarterbacks turned out to be elite talents, making high-profile matchups all but inevitable.

The first was on January 24, 2021, date of the AFC Championship Game which, based on playoff seeding, took place in Kansas City. By that time, Mahomes and the Chiefs had already won a Super Bowl (the franchise’s second), while the Bills were just happy to be there. The Chiefs won 38-24, though they did lose the next game—Super Bowl LV—to Tom Brady and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

The second meeting was on January 23, 2022, again in Kansas City, this one in the divisional playoff round. Allen and the Bills had matured into legitimate contenders, and simply showing up was no longer sufficient. A mind-boggling back and forth in the final two minutes of regulation resulted in perhaps the greatest two minutes in NFL history and a 36-33 lead for Buffalo with 13 seconds left. There was only problem—after kicking it off, they miraculously allowed the Chiefs to get into field-goal range, tie the game, and win 42-36 in overtime.

It became apparent that for the Bills to avoid further devastation and beat the Chiefs when it mattered, the game would have to take place in Buffalo. That finally happened on January 21, 2024, again in the divisional playoff round. With less than two minutes left, the Bills had an opportunity to tie the game. As had happened in the final seconds of a certain game in 1991, a field goal attempt sailed wide right. In this case, the result wasn’t Super Bowl heartbreak—it was just another playoff loss to the Chiefs.

Throughout this stretch, the Bills have consistently beaten the Chiefs during the less meaningful regular season, yet another sign of maltreatment. It’s called kindness, followed by abject cruelty.

As above, the team from Western New York has never won a Super Bowl—the Chiefs are now up to four.

The most famous significant other in Buffalo is a decent actress from the Pitch Perfect movies.

The most famous significant other in Kansas City is literally the most famous person in the world.

So as a fourth playoff meeting approaches, go ahead and call this Bills-Chiefs thing a rivalry if you must.

I, on the other hand, am obligated as a healthcare provider to report abuse when I see it.

And trust me when I tell you, the authorities have been notified.

Sanjay Gosalia, a Kansas City native, contributed to this (depressing) story.