This was the same team that was getting thumped 28-3 for three quarters in the Super Bowl. And like that team, they have a history of responding to this kind of setback.
FOXBOROUGH, Mass. — More than any sports franchise on American soil, the New England Patriots refuse to bask in the glories of their past. Bill Belichick won a record fifth Super Bowl title on a record comeback in February, and before he even boarded the plane heading home he was complaining he was five weeks behind the league-wide losers in preparing for 2017.
The Patriots live the stay-in-the-moment cliché every hour of every day. They don’t spend any more time polishing past trophies than they do booking Super Bowl hotel reservations in the middle of October. But on Thursday night, before opening the season against a room-temperature opponent, the Kansas City Chiefs, the Patriots finally surrendered to human nature. They finally stopped for a moment to tell themselves, You know what, we are pretty damn special.
The Patriots’ title defense got off to a stunningly bad start, as the Chiefs strung together big play after big play in an opening-night romp. All things are possible for the Chiefs after victory over Patriots Alex Smith and the Chiefs dismantled the defending champs on their home field Thursday, opening the season with a resounding 42-27 win.
And they are, of course. Given that the NFL has long seen parity as a virtue, and uses the draft, salary cap, schedule, and free agency to protect that virtue, the Patriots of Belichick and Tom Brady might go down as the greatest dynasty in all of team sports.
They had earned their pregame party and the unveiling of their new banner. But the postings on the Gillette Stadium scoreboards that read «ATL 28 NE 3» and «2: 12 3RD QTR» seemed a bit overdone for a franchise that never dances in yesterday’s confetti. So did the five oversized Lombardi Trophies that were rolled onto the field, along with the thousands of fans who booed Roger Goodell when he stepped onto the field during warm-ups, wearing T-shirts and waving towels carrying the image of Goodell wearing a clown’s red nose.
Yes, in his first regular-season appearance in Foxborough since Deflategate turned into a raging hot mess, Goodell might’ve had a harsh New England welcome coming to him. But the Patriots have won two Super Bowls since that story first broke. The team and its fans had already won that fight, and yet continued to spend time and energy flailing away at a commissioner who made himself an easy target.
So in that context, it was fitting the Patriots opened a season that some observers, including this one, believed could end with an historic 19-0 record and got hammered by the Chiefs, who came in a lot hotter than room temperature after all. They scored 42 points, more than any points New England has ever surrendered in Belichick’s 17-plus years. They gained 537 yards, more than any yards New England has ever surrendered in Belichick’s 17-plus years. Just as the Chiefs did in 2014, when they dropped 41 on the Patriots in Week 4, they made the ageless Brady look about as old as his birth certificate suggested.
Brady went under center Thursday night as a 40-year-old regular-season starter for the first time. When he was done misfiring on 20-of-36 passes and failing to throw for a single touchdown, nobody dared write or say that Brady was done as a dynasty maker the way they wrote and said he was done in 2014. He was angry all the same. Brady was asked about Rob Gronkowski’s failure to hold on to a touchdown pass in the first quarter, a pass that could’ve given the Patriots a 14-0 lead and instead altered the momentum of the game, and this is what he said:
«That was a disappointing play. I mean, that would have been a big play in the game. We just didn’t make it. We didn’t make a lot of plays tonight actually. So we just have to be a lot better in a lot of areas, starting with our attitude and competitiveness.»
Attitude and competitiveness? Tom Brady was questioning his team’s attitude and competitiveness?
«I just think we need to have more urgency, » he said, «and go out there and perform a lot better. That is a winning attitude, a championship attitude, that you need to bring every day, and we had it handed to us on our own field. It’s a terrible feeling.»
It’s a rare feeling, too. The Chiefs beat the Patriots with the blazing speed of Tyreek Hill and rookie Kareem Hunt, who had scores of 75 and 78 yards, and with decisive power and patience on the 90-yard drive following the missed Brady-Gronk connection in the first quarter. When the Patriots tried to keep their offense on the field in short-yardage situations, the Chiefs physically dominated them up front and made the game-shaping stops.
«Just a very poor effort, » Brady said.
«Bad defense, bad coaching, bad playing, bad football, » a barely audible Belichick said. «There were problems all over the place.»
The defensive front was as concerning as advertised, as Alex Smith, a consistent and reliable character actor, suddenly turned into Marlon Brando. He threw for 368 yards and four touchdowns, including his 75-yarder to a wide-open Hill streaking down the sideline at Olympic-like speed.
Even before Danny Amendola went down because of his head injury, Brady was going to miss Julian Edelman and Malcolm Mitchell — especially Edelman. As much as it was mentioned that Brady won it all without Gronkowski last season, Edelman did make the most important and most bizarre catch in the Super Bowl LI victory over Atlanta, and he did score the winning touchdown in the Super Bowl XLIX victory over Seattle. He had more than 1,100 receiving yards last year. His absence was going to hurt.
In the end, Kansas City acted as if it didn’t want to be Kansas City anymore. The Chiefs have averaged nearly 11 wins over the regular season for the past four years but have fizzled in the playoffs. But the Chiefs looked hungrier and angrier than the Patriots. At halftime, Michele Tafoya of NBC said she had a conversation with Belichick about the way the first 30 minutes went down, but that Kansas City coach Andy Reid refused to talk. You know a coach is locked in when he rejects an interview request that Belichick accepts.
Before Thursday night, the Patriots had won 87 consecutive home games when leading at the half. Before Thursday night, Brady had won 52 consecutive home games against AFC opponents when he’d effectively played the entire game.
None of that means New England should start scouting Josh Rosen and Sam Darnold. The previous three times the Patriots lost their season opener, they ended up winning the whole thing.
But first they need to figure out how to field a competitive defense. Oh, and they also need to forget about their absurd comeback victory over Atlanta.
In Week 1 of the 2017 season, the Patriots cut against their own grain and reminded the world one more time about that 28-3 deficit they overcame. And then they played like they did for the first 43 minutes in Houston last February, this time with no miracle in sight.

Similarity rank: 15

Sentiment rank: 0.7

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Kansas City’s normally methodical attack showed it could be far more explosive in 2017.
FOXBOROUGH, Mass. – In the process of slaying a giant in the stunner of an NFL opener on Thursday night, the Kansas City Chiefs sure busted a lot of myths.
So you thought Alex Smith, that game manager of a quarterback, was ripe to be replaced?
Think again.
Smith looked like the second coming of Joe Montana during the 42-27 upheaval of the New England Patriots. Not only did he pass for four touchdowns without an interception, but he connected on a 75-yard touchdown to Tyreek Hill and a 78-yard scoring strike to the wondrous rookie, Kareem Hunt.
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Wait a minute. Smith supposedly does not have that type of downfield throwing ability, which was perceived to be a reason the Chiefs moved up to draft his eventual replacement, strong-armed Patrick Mahomes.
After all, during his first 12 NFL seasons, Smith had all of two TD passes of at least 75 yards.
Well, Smith had that arm at Gillette Stadium – where it started loud and ended quiet. On the pass to Hill, he demonstrated how he can chuck it as the blazing receiver zipped right past cornerback Stephon Gilmore and safety Devin McCourty’s busted coverage to isolate himself along the sideline. Yes, Smith could get the ball there. And on time, allowing Hill to catch it in stride.
The pass to Hunt – whose 246 yards from scrimmage were the most in an opener since the 1970 merger – had even better touch. Smith’s throw traveled about 40 yards and was placed perfectly over the shoulder of beaten defensive end Cassius Marsh. Hunt scampered the last 47 yards to pay dirt.
The deep strikes were the signature plays from a performance that undoubtedly ranks as one of the best games of Smith’s 13-year career. If that’s a new dimension for Kansas City’s offense, which would coincide with the instant threat that Hill brings, this might be some sort of juggernaut.
More: Tom Brady calls out Patriots’ effort after Chiefs’ historic outburst
More: Chiefs RB Kareem Hunt looks to be budding star in record-setting debut
But first things first. If you think Smith had extra fuel because of the buzz that the rookie Mahomes generated with an impressive summer, well, that’s another myth.
He insists that he drew no extra satisfaction for proving something to doubters.
“If you had asked me that seven, eight years ago, I would give you what you’ re looking for there, ” Smith said. “I really don’ t care. To be honest, this has been the most drama-free camp. I haven’ t been dwelling on that. For whatever reason, I’ ve just been playing, enjoying the opportunity and not looking beyond it.”
While Smith gained more rhythm and flow as the night progressed, Hunt, a third-round pick from Toledo, provided the answer to another myth – that the Chiefs offense would be in huge trouble without Spencer Ware. When Kansas City drafted Hunt, it seemed likely that he’ d break in as a complementary back to Ware, the team’s leading rusher last season.
But stuff happens. Ware is gone for the season after tearing a knee ligament. Hunt proved on opening night that he could handle a full load – even after losing a fumble on his first NFL carry. He had 22 touches (17 rushes, five receptions) while becoming the first player put up 200 yards from scrimmage with three TDs since Billy Sims in 1980. He rushed for 148 yards, averaging a whopping 8.7 yards per carry.
The Chiefs wound up with 537 yards and three scoring drives of at least 90 yards. If those weren’ t myths, they surely were not typical. A Bill Belichick defense has never allowed as many points or yards in a game during the coach’s Patriots tenure. All of last season, the Chiefs had one drive of 90 yards. You’ d have to go back to 2008 to find a season when they had two 90-yard drives. And here they had three in one game.
Hey, strange stuff must happen when Roger Goodell is in the house. When they fell behind by 10 points early in the second quarter, it may have seemed like they were deflated already. Remember, the Chiefs aren’ t built to come from behind. We’ re not talking about the Patriots here.
Myth busted.
And while they were at it, the Chiefs demonstrated just how effective an NFL team can be using all the creative wrinkles afforded with spread offense concepts and read-option plays.
There were option pitches, shovel passes and end-arounds. Creative stuff that kept the Patriots off balance and generated some timely plays.
This, remember, in a league where supposedly the college offenses won’ t work anymore.
Myth busted.
“It’s a blend of what Alex had done before, ” Reid said, referring to Smith’s college days at Utah, “and what these young kids have done. We’ ve mixed it in, made it part of our base offense. We had a couple different wrinkles (on Thursday night) , and we had a whole offseason to work on it and we were able to use some of those things.”
And it worked, like every other myth-busting element of a winning game plan.
Follow NFL columnist Jarrett Bell on Twitter @JarrettBell .
PHOTOS: Best of NFL Week 1

Similarity rank: 15

Sentiment rank: -1.4

© Source: https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/nfl/chiefs/2017/09/08/kansas-city-chiefs-alex-smith-kareem-hunt-tyreek-hill/644979001/
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