Bills-Chiefs has become the NFL’s defining rivalry of its age

The Kansas City Chiefs and Buffalo Bills are becoming an annual rite, and the games are defining a generation of NFL football.

Every era has its rivalry.

In the 1970s, it was the Oakland Raiders and Pittsburgh Steelers. The ’90s had the Dallas Cowboys and San Francisco 49ers. The ’00s saw Peyton Manning and Tom Brady turn games between the Indianapolis Colts and New England Patriots into must-see TV.

The current generation found its rivalry on Jan. 23, 2022.

That night, the Kansas City Chiefs and Buffalo Bills played what is arguably the greatest football game of all time. It will forever be boiled down to and known as 13 Seconds, but the other 64 minutes and two seconds played that evening meant every bit as much.

For a true rivalry to emerge, both teams must be capable of beating the other. There also must be an iconic moment, an indelible image, a marquee matchup which captures the imagination.

Buffalo and Kansas City checked all boxes in one clash, setting up the next decade.

This Sunday, the Bills and Chiefs will meet for the fifth time with Josh Allen and Patrick Mahomes squaring off. Mahomes has won three of the first four tilts, including both postseason affairs. Yet Allen has proven a worthy foe, as evidenced in his pair of 300-yard games last year, including a 38-20 stomping of Kansas City in Week 5 at Arrowhead.

But while this week’s meeting will be filled with hyperbole and overreactions, the reality is this moment is about the bigger picture, both for this season and future campaigns. This is but a chapter in the book, helping to set up the rest of the novel.

For Buffalo to truly earn equal footing with Kansas City, it must win a Super Bowl. The Colts were always fun with Manning, but they weren’t complete until they vanquished the Patriots in the 2006 AFC Championship Game in Indianapolis. The Raiders were a hated foe for the Steelers, but they weren’t more than a dangerous foil until they overcame Pittsburgh in the ’76 conference title game before winning it all.

The Bills are perhaps more talented than the Chiefs, but they’ve yet to reach a Super Bowl with this group. The last two years for Buffalo have ended at Arrowhead in bitter disappointment.

So while winning in Week 6 is nice, its biggest impact could be helping the Bills finally secure the AFC’s top seed, something it hasn’t done since 1993.

Of course, ’93 was the last time Buffalo went to the Super Bowl. Ironically, the Bills beat Joe Montana and the Chiefs in the AFC Championship Game that year.

For Kansas City, Week 6 is about respect.

The Chiefs have been the league’s best team since Mahomes became the full-time starter in 2018, going 54-16 in that stretch. They’ve hosted every AFC title game in that span, and reached two Super Bowls while winning one. If Kansas City wins it all this year, a case can be made for it being a dynasty.

And yet, despite entering Sunday with the same 4-1 record as Buffalo, the Chiefs are three-point underdogs at home. It’s the first time in Mahomes’ career he’s been getting points from the Vegas sportsbooks in a game at Arrowhead. In eight career games as an underdog, Mahomes is 6-2, with a 7-0-1 record against the spread.

Mahomes and the Chiefs also want to prove they’re still top dog even without star receiver Tyreek Hill. They’d certainly love to keep the potential rematch in Kansas City, instead of traveling to the inhospitable winter weather of Buffalo come late January.

Both teams realize this is likely a prelude to what is almost certainly Part 2 in a few months. This is nothing more than a setup, the penultimate episode to the season finale.

But for the Bills and Chiefs, every meeting is a referendum, a national happening. It’s a measuring stick for each, the two best teams in football, getting an annual moment to see how they stack against their main competition.

Every NFL era is defined by a rivalry. Buffalo and Kansas City are the current duo.