Who's to Blame for Chiefs' Playoff Loss? Part 1: The Media

This is part 1 of what I hope will be a weeklong series about what went wrong in the Chiefs' embarassing loss to the Colts.

My first target for blame is the media, simply because of its relevancy after the BCS Championship game. I was sitting at a Buckeye bar with a bunch of friends watching the Gators absolutely pummel the Buckeyes. I'm not a Buckeye fan, nor do I dislike them. With college football, I just like to watch a good football game. Still, it was a very nice pick-me-up to see other fans suffer as much as I suffered after watching my Chiefs lose just as embarassingly to the Colts.

The BCS Championship game was like the Colts vs. Chiefs game in so many ways. First of all, the blue team beat the red team in a very high-stakes game. Secondly, and more interestingly, the Gators went into the game as the team that didn't belong. Instead of the nation celebrating Florida's berth in the championship game, it seemed as if the media was more interested in reasons why Florida didn't belong there than why they might have belonged. All the media attention seemed to surround Troy Smith, Florida's terrific defense, Jim Tressel's sweater vest, and the Ohio State Buckeyes' dominating defense. It's almost a surprise the Buckeyes weren't handed the BCS championship trophy without even playing in the game.So instead of being celebrated as one of the top 2 teams in the country, instead the Gators heard all week about how they didn't belong, how they were going to get crushed, how the Buckeyes were going to embarass the Gators on national TV in front of their friends, families, butchers, mechanics, and doctors.

The Gators played as if they had a giant chip on their shoulder. Sound familiar, Chiefs' and Colts' fans? It should. The media beat the Colts' run defense to the ground. They were expected to give up 100+, 150+, 200+ yards. Any possibility the Colts could have given up over 1,000 yards in one game? The media would have you believe such. What I saw from the Colts was a pissed-off football team. It was a team that was tired of hearing the media slap them in the face. The Chiefs, on the other hand, looked like a team that was happy just to be there. The Chiefs took a trip to Indy, went to see a play or hit up some nice restaurants. All-in-all, a nice, pleasant tourist vacation for our good ole' Chiefs. Oh yeah, and they had a chance to play a little game called football in the process.

I was scared of this hype from the beginning, as I mentioned in my other blog at Most Valuable Network. There's only so much a grown man can take, especially when you play for a tough playoff team like the Colts. The Chiefs were the underdog, yet the media managed to make it a trap game for the Chiefs.

The rest is history. So there you go, media. Thank you for giving the Colts the fire and steam to finally play run defense.