The Chiefs' dynasty is dead. The Eagles' never even got started

Most people watching last week's game between the Kansas City Chiefs and Houston Texans probably thought, early in the fourth quarter, that the Chiefs would pull out the win. Even a lot of Houston fans.

Kansas City had recovered from a brutal first half to tie the game at 10, and the defense was repeatedly stifling the Houston offense. Everyone has seen this movie before, many times. Patrick Mahomes would scramble around and make some plays, Travis Kelce would find some space for a crucial drive-extending catch, and in the end the eulogies for the Chiefs would have to be put on hold for at least another week.

But then, funny thing: the Chiefs gave the game away. They couldn't convert on a (wildly aggressive) fourth-down call, handing the Texans a short field. Houston seemed totally energized by this gift, quickly scoring a touchdown that turned the game (and narrative) on its head.

Suddenly, the usual Kansas City bag of tricks was strangely empty.

There was no back-breaking Mahomes scramble for a first down, no threaded pass to Kelce in traffic, no Andy Reid wizardry to target an unknown tight end who had just been activated from the practice squad. The Chiefs didn't score again, falling to 6-7 to leave them teetering on the brink of playoff elimination.

The eulogies are being drafted again.

A night later, it was the Philadelphia Eagles, the team that beat the Chiefs in the Super Bowl last season, who suffered a prime-time embarrassment.

Playing against a severely compromised Justin Herbert and the Los Angeles Chargers, the Eagles muddled along with their typically stilted offense, and even a long-awaited explosive touchdown run from Saquon Barkley wasn't enough.

Jalen Hurts threw his fourth (!) interception of the night in overtime to seal the loss and drop the Eagles to 8-5. Philadelphia, still on top in the pitiful NFC East, has a good shot at the playoffs with a soft schedule ahead, but Eagles fans cannot feel great about what will happen once there. It's never a good sign when there are calls to bring a retired player, in this case former center Jason Kelce, out of a television studio and back onto the field.

That both of last season's Super Bowl participants have fallen into such a malaise is somehow fitting for this strangest of NFL seasons, one in which the AFC leaders are currently the Broncos, Patriots, and Jaguars. But the degree of the collapse is still striking.

The Chiefs might simply be a product of time catching up to them. Where the Patriots once made it look like a dynasty could last forever, the much more common scenario is that championship windows don't stay open long in the parity-engineered NFL. Kansas City's offensive line has looked shaky for a couple of seasons now, the running game is ineffective, and that Mahomes-Kelce combination that used to overcome a lot of flaws seems to have finally curdled. The Chiefs also pulled out an unsustainable number of one-score wins in 2024; even as they stacked up victories, they weren't the dominant force of the best Mahomes-Reid years.

The Philadelphia situation is more unexpected, considering how strong they looked in rolling to that Super Bowl win. But a sharp decline in their ability to run the ball has exposed the limits of a Hurts-led offense. He doesn't throw to the middle of the field much - if ever - and so defenders can focus on guarding the boundaries.

What caused the running-game collapse? Injuries to the offensive line, the Kelce retirement, and possibly the fact that Barkley was used so much last season. Whatever the reasons, 14 weeks should be plenty of time for a unit to sort out its business, which is why there are so many calls in Philadelphia for offensive coordinator Kevin Patullo's head on a pike.

Weirdly, while Philadelphia is in a much better current position this season than Kansas City, it's the latter that has less uncertainty over its future. Mahomes is still just 30 years old, even if he's already had a Hall of Fame career, and there is plenty of time for a second act, whether with Reid or a new coach.

The Eagles, barring a back-from-the-dead revival this season, will face tougher questions when it ends. Hurts is a player who has few comparables in sports history: he's great at some very specific things, poor at others, but has played his absolute best in two Super Bowl appearances. That's basically the opposite of how this is supposed to work, Eli Manning excepted.

It seems impossible to imagine that they would try to move on from either Hurts or head coach Nick Sirianni - two NFC titles and one Super Bowl win in four seasons - but the fact that these are even points for debate is wild given the very recent accomplishments.

The Eagles are much more likely to make the playoffs, and yet it's the Chiefs, for all their flaws, that might make more noise if they get there. They play that same compromised Chargers team that the Eagles couldn't handle this weekend.

Maybe don't finish off those eulogies just yet.

Scott Stinson is a contributing writer for theScore.