KANSAS CITY, Mo. — About a blink of an eye ago, Patrick Mahomes was the fledgling face of the NFL’s future. Four years back, the 23-year-old in his first season as QB1 hoisted the Chiefs to the brink of their first Super Bowl appearance in two generations before they fell in overtime to the New England Patriots … and then-41-year-old Tom Brady.
Even if there was no baton passed that day, and not quite since by the ageless Brady, Mahomes was named the NFL’s Most Valuable Player after that season.
A year later, he fully transitioned from that promising debut to become the current, and presiding, most compelling force in the game by leading the Chiefs to their first Super Bowl victory in 50 years. With an MVP performance there, no less.
Everything about his first few years and his game itself with the Chiefs still looks and feels like a fresh adventure as the top-seeded Chiefs (14-3) seek to reach their fifth straight AFC Championship Game and third Super Bowl in four seasons.
That’s why he’s on trajectory to be named MVP again after leading the NFL in passing yards (5,250) and touchdown passes (41) and setting a league record for combined yards on offense (5,614) — a mark he said was “obviously cool” but felt the need to qualify by mentioning that he’d broken Drew Brees’ record in an extra game.
But there’s another reason that coach Andy Reid so often makes a point of telling those around Mahomes to enjoy and appreciate every moment of his career.
Because, alas, this can’t last forever. The inevitable creep of time is ever-ticking.
So while it’s perhaps more symbolic and quirky than anything else, the fact that the 27-year-old Mahomes is the oldest of the projected AFC playoff quarterback starters is a reminder that the present — which he is in more ways than one — is ever-fleeting.
It’s a reminder right here, right now, to revel in all that Mahomes brings to the Chiefs and Kansas City and the NFL and that every postseason opportunity still is rare and priceless because this can’t be infinite.
“I have two kids now. I’m married. I’m kind of an old soul,” he said Monday, smiling at the notion of being “literally the oldest quarterback” in the AFC playoff bracket. “It speaks to the talent that we have in the AFC (that) the guys I’m looking around at are going to be there for a long time.
“So I’ll be the old head in the AFC for a while now, and I’ll try to use that experience to my advantage.”
If you’re like me, you figure the best still awaits Mahomes. Like the long-ago Clairol Loving Care commercial, he’s not getting older; he’s getting better.
And there’s ample precedent for that upward arc at this semi-advanced age in Chiefs’ quarterbacking history alone.
In 1962, the then-Dallas Texans of the AFL took a stray chance on resetting the aimless career of a quarterback who had started two games in five NFL seasons and was considering quitting the game.
That was one Len Dawson.
“To tell you the truth, I was awful after five years of not playing,” he said in Canton during his induction into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1987. “The skills that I once had were gone.”
Signed 10 days after his 27th birthday and rejuvenated by his longtime relationship with Hank Stram, Dawson went on to lead the Texans-Chiefs to three AFL titles, two of the first four Super Bowls and their only previous Super Bowl triumph.
So, somehow, it turns out there is life after 27 even for NFL quarterbacks.
Especially those who want to prolong their careers and have access to far more sophisticated and comprehensive ways to do so now than they did in yesteryear.
The 45-year-old Brady, who has completed career highs in passes in each of the last two seasons (albeit also with the help of the two-year-old 17-game schedule) might be considered a freakish outlier of an example. But there’s no immediate reason to think Mahomes can’t thrive another decade or more.
Mahomes, like Brady, has long embraced the offseason regimen of a training guru. In Mahomes’ case, that’s Bobby Stroupe, with whom he grew up training … and who has since moved here.
Mahomes’ dedication and work ethic, both in the regular season and offseason, remain exemplary. His ever-expanding and entrancing play reflects that.
One of the most appealing parts about that is how he continues to find new ways to create … and even still possesses an unassuming sense of wonder about his own work at times. Asked his favorite play of the season, Mahomes pointed to the no-look, flick-fling or whatever it was to Jerick McKinnon for a 56-yard touchdown at Denver:
“Just because it was one where I legit did not think I was throwing the ball at all. I was just trying to get the ball out of my hands as soon as possible. And then … seeing how it looked, it looked sweet. So that would probably be my favorite play of this season. So far.”
That moment is just one of many that speak to why he’s officially been the MVP of the NFL once and unofficially ever since. And now on the precipice of adding another that he figures he’d cherish even more than the first even as it’s clear nothing matters more to him than winning the Super Bowl.
Because even the MVP trophy, he said, “symbolizes the team that was around you” and amplifies the memories of what was achieved together
Moreover ...
“I think winning the MVP or winning the Super Bowl again, I’ll have a greater appreciation for it because I’ve been through the trials and struggles of losing,” he said.
(Never mind that as a starter Mahomes, in fact, is 64-16 in regular-season games and 8-3 in the postseason.)
That first season, he added, “I was just throwing the ball around. And you win the MVP, and I’m like, ‘Oh, this is what we do every year. We win MVPs, we get to AFC Championship games and win Super Bowls.’ ”
That all looks different since having lost a Super Bowl to Brady’s Tampa Bay team and the AFC Championship game to Cincinnati last season.
“It builds,” he said, “a greater appreciation for the grind.”
Spoken like the oldest starting quarterback in the AFC playoffs as he keeps seeking to seize a present we should all relish.
