Moving the Chains: Raining on their parade

Another NFL season is officially in the record books. Here’s a reminder of how things ended up:

The Kansas City Chiefs won their third NFL championship in the past five years as incredibly talented, if not grossly overpaid (a perspective on that shortly), quarterback Patrick Mahomes won his third Super Bowl MVP award and pop star Taylor Swift saw her latest arm candy perform on the game’s biggest stage.

That being said, all must be good in Missouri, right?

Uh, maybe not. Let’s take a closer look at three different incidents perhaps telling a different story.

The first incident involves the game itself: specifically, the player who has inspired young boys all over the Show Me State to wear his red #87 jersey … and young girls — Swifties, they’re called — all over the country tacking posters of their favorite singer embracing her latest himbo on their bedroom walls. Number 87, Swift’s himbo, is Travis Kelce. Six-foot-five, 250-pound Travis Kelce.

The same Travis Kelce who, allegedly angered that he was taken out of the game in the first half, pushed his 65-year-old head coach Andy Reid so hard on the sideline that the older man momentarily lost his balance … while Kelce continued to shout in his face until he was finally pulled away by a teammate.

Although both Kelce and Reid downplayed the incident afterward — Kelce apologized for being out of line, and Reid brushed it off as a player simply being passionate about the game he loved — the harm was done. The boys wearing his #87 jerseys and the girls with #87’s face a couple of feet above their pillows witnessed their idol, as it were, acting the fool. Not only that, they saw a grown man shouting and getting physical with a man who was not only an elderly and physically inferior man, but who also happened to be the grown man’s boss.

What kind of an example is that for the younger generation to see? If I’m being overly dramatic, I apologize. It’s just that the way I was brought up, this kind of thing is just not acceptable. Besides, aren’t these guys being paid for things other than scoring touchdowns and making tackles? Like being mature, grown men and setting some kind of example for the fans who help pay their ginormous salaries?

Enough on that. Let’s move on to the second incident: the aftermath of the Chiefs-Dolphins Jan. 13 Wild Card playoff game in Kansas City — the coldest game in Arrowhead Stadium history. Game time temperature was minus 4 degrees, and the wind chill took it down another 23 degrees. That equates to the fans in the stadium being exposed to temperatures around 59 degrees colder than it takes water to freeze. For several hours.

Meanwhile, over in Buffalo, the Bills’ scheduled Jan. 14 playoff game against the Pittsburgh Steelers was postponed for a day … due to dangerous weather conditions. There were predictions of heavy snow and wind gusts up to 50 miles per hour that would make for hazardous road conditions, thus the one-day delay. As things turned out, it proved to be a wise decision.

As for Kansas City, the game was played as scheduled. Much to their fans’ delight, the Chiefs won. So that’s the good news. Now for the bad: some of the fans at that game had to have fingers or toes amputated later on because of frostbite, which is what happens when people are exposed to temperatures around 59 degrees colder than it takes water to freeze for several hours.

That brings up the question of liability: who is responsible? I’m not a lawyer, so I’ll just leave that right here for others to ponder. But in the meantime, think about this: what if one of those amputated fingers belonged to Patrick Mahomes? This is a man whose salary — if it was prorated — would beg the question: what happens if your star quarterback loses one of his $45 million fingers? For one thing, he might have to kiss a fourth Super Bowl MVP award goodbye.

The third incident is what took place on the streets of Kansas City just three days after the Chiefs’ biggest win of the season: the victorious Super Bowl Parade. An estimate one million fans lined the streets of Kansas City to revel in the joyous and festive victory celebration.

Only as more often than not seems to be the case these days, what should have been a joyous occasion took a deadly turn for the worse: one person was killed and another 22 people were shot, 11 of them children. Days later, two adults and two juveniles were charged in connection with the shooting, and the adults were eventually charged with murder.

Certainly, rain had fallen on Kansas City’s parade.

However, despite the three incidents, the people of Missouri still have one more Lombardi trophy to boast about.

Whatever the expense.

Scott Ludwig lives, runs and walks in Senoia. His latest compilation of 101 columns, “Southern Accent,” complements “Southern Charm,” “Southern Comfort” and “Southern Hospitality,” his first three compilations. Other books in his Southern Exposure series include “Finding the Words,” “Portraits of the South” and ‘let me tell you a funny story.’ All of his books can be found on his author page on Amazon.