Chiefs and Raiders Set to Renew Rivalry in Prime Time
The Kansas City Chiefs and Las Vegas Raiders are set to meet at GEHA Field at Arrowhead Stadium in a primetime matchup on Monday Night Football. The rivalry between the Chiefs and Raiders dates back decades, but the Raiders haven't held up their end of the bargain since moving to Las Vegas.
Back in the 1960s and 1970s when the Raiders found their home in Oakland and in the 1980s and early 1990s in Los Angeles, there was a great rivalry between the two teams. Just talk to any player or coach from the 60s through the 90s and they’ll let you know how intense the rivalry was during their era of Chiefs football. Many people point back to the brawl of 1970 when the feud took off to new heights.
Legendary quarterback Len Dawson had just rushed for a first down when Raiders defensive end Ben Davidson ran full-force and speared Dawson while he was on the ground after the play was over. Chiefs wide receiver Otis Taylor didn’t take kindly to that move and defended his star quarterback.
This led to a benches-clearing brawl with both players being penalized, the first down being called back due to the offsetting penalties and the Chiefs replaying the down. It would eventually lead to a Chiefs punt and the Raiders scoring the game-tying field goal. The game ended in a 17-17 tie. That tie led to the Raiders winning the division over the Chiefs.
Benches-clearing brawls don’t happen anymore. The league has changed. Players aren’t as loyal to teams and teams aren’t as loyal to players as they once were. Rivalries in the NFL have changed on the field over the years, but they can still resonate deeply with fans. The history is still there, even if players and coaches in today’s game may not hype it up as much as in previous decades.
On Thursday, Chiefs head coach Andy Reid was asked if he prepares the team differently in Raider week.
"No, you just have to get ready," Reid said. "You have to get ready to play a good team first and then whatever takes place after that, but they have a lot of skill and they’ve got good bigs, and so you’ve got to prepare yourself right and that’s the most important thing."
In other words, this is just another game for Reid. Quarterback Patrick Mahomes seems to have more of a feel for the history of the rivalry, at least more than Reid wants to admit. When asked about what makes Raider week different, Mahomes had an interesting response.
"You just know it’s going to be a battle every single time," Mahomes said on Thursday. "Both teams trying to play their best football, it’s a true rivalry, we know that it doesn’t matter what the records are – you’re going to go out there and play, it’s going to be a dog fight. And they have a great football team, their record – they don’t have the best record - but every game, they’ve been in the game or been leading the game at certain points, so we understand it’s going to be a great challenge for us.”
Mahomes gives the Raiders more credit than most in the media world, including myself. The Raiders are 1-3 four games into the 2022 season, but since Reid has arrived, there hasn’t been much of a rivalry when it comes to wins and losses. The Chiefs are 15-3 against the Raiders over the past decade since Reid arrived in Kansas City. Maybe that’s why Reid is treating this like any other game.
Since Mahomes burst onto the scene, the Chiefs are 7-1 against the Raiders. The team is averaging 37.4 points per game in those meetings. Mahomes has been an unstoppable force, throwing for 2,546 yards, 22 touchdowns and three interceptions over that span.
On the other side of the rivalry, Raiders quarterback Derek Carr is 3-13 all-time against the Chiefs. He has one win against Mahomes, which came in unpredictable fashion at Arrowhead Stadium, where a postgame bus ride shared the headlines.
Former Raiders head coach Jon Gruden took his team on a victory lap around the parking lot before their bus went to the airport following that win. It gave the rivalry a little bit of juice for a short time, but if the Raiders won more than once every four years, maybe the rivalry would have more fuel for the fire.
Not only will the Raiders have to deal with a good 3-1 Chiefs team, but it seems like Mahomes takes this team to another level when it comes to primetime games. Mahomes is 15-2 in his last 17 primetime matchups. He’s thrown for 4,800 yards, 38 touchdowns, and nine interceptions during that stretch. His 17-game stretch of primetime performances would be an impressive season-long stat line.
Truth be told, the Chiefs and Raiders rivalry has lost a little sizzle over the years. While fans may go back and forth on social media leading up to the game, the Chiefs have dominated the series in recent years. The Raiders are continually trying to catch up to the Chiefs, and it seems like that will be the case for a while longer, as long as Andy Reid and Patrick Mahomes are in Kansas City.
