Tradition Tuesday: Buckshot de Confianza

Editor's Note: The rough focus of this blog is the rivalry between the Kansas City Chiefs (heralded by yours truly) and the Denver Broncos (defended and whined about by Cecil and Old Number 7). It may seem unfair that it's two vs. one, but once KC gets that second Super Bowl we'll even out the delegation.

Seven years ago we started The Tradition, in which Brrrrrr-onco fans traveled out to the Truman Sports Complex with their team, and lovers of all things CHIEFS returned to the Rocky Mountains with theirs. We tailgate, we talk massive amounts of shit, our wives occasionally get assaulted by rival fans, and we almost always watch the visiting team lose. It's a grand old time.

Here at the HoG, we're going to keep The Tradition alive all year long with Tradition Tuesday--a weekly state-of-the-rivalry address.

This week, we'll look at fan confidence.

Every off-season, Cecil puts together a well-written, entertaining, disturbingly accurate prediction of how the Denver Broncos will fare in the forthcoming season. Two words into reading it, Old #7 sports the kind of massive wood they warn you about in those annoying commercials you hate to watch with your wives, moms and sisters in the room.

Once he's cleaned his Tommy John surgery up, he repeats the process over and over until he makes it to the end of the first paragraph. Then he adds his dos centavos. Like his Mile-High city counterpart, he too is accurate, confident, and entirely disturbing.

In short, the season rolls around, and, as mentioned in the above Editor's Note, the home team almost always wins.

We're all aware that, upon conclusion of last year's regular season, the Chiefs snuck into the playoffs with the help of Joe Nedney's overtime field goal in Denver. On New Year's Eve. Aside from the fact that sewage rocketed out of our kitchen sink moments before our first party guests arrived, it was a glorious evening.

The Broncos players, pillars of the community that they are, went clubbin' and acted as a sponge for random bullets and blood spray.

The Chiefs players went to Indianapolis to face the would-be Super Bowl champions.

Outcome: not one happy AFC West fan on the planet.

This off-season, Denver, like they always do, added nice depth to their roster via free agency and the draft. Nabbing Brandon Stokely, Dre Bly, Travis Henry, etc. will pay huge dividends for the Broncos. The Chiefs, regardless of the completion of the new head coach's first season, continued their off-season rituals of losing key linemen to retirement, getting DUIs, griping about contracts and drafting pretty shittily.

Thus, the theme of today's installment. Denver, as opening day approaches, will have its collective cock sucked by every major media figure (excepting those that Cecil despises, which is like 97% of them), and there will be talks of conference championship appearances, Elway's replacement finally being under center, and the perennial beat the Pats/lose to Chesning consistencies.

The Chiefs will win most of the games they should, lose all the ones they should, and be just shy of division championship contention. And I will be thrilled. Not to worry. The Tradition will still happen. As a bit of change, Cec' and 7 will roll into town first this year; I'll bite my tongue at how lame the venue/tailgating/fans/team/ownership/coach is when I hit Denver in late November. I'll be wearing my Zubaz with pockets overflowing with the one thing all Chiefs fans feign: hope.

And I'll go home swearing to cease my heart-wrenched fandom of football. All will be right with the world.

Therefore, I personally cannot wait for football season to start. Everything looks par for both clubs. As our beloved Hermenator stated last year, "The way to be a playoff team is to win the division." That was about the only thing he said all season that was accurate.

This division is tough. Even with the Raiders in it. Landing that wildcard spot last year took literally until time expired in the last game of the season. You can't bank on getting one of those spots. This is the Ass-Kicking Football Conference. Not the Nearly Fucked-up-our Chances side. It's only a matter of time before east-coast media, the four-letter network, and the rest of the world realizes that Chiefs-Broncos football is as good as it gets.

Even woman-assaulting diamond cutters that, for no particular reason, support his Clownness, realizes that.

It's May, not that hot yet, and not quite free-agency deadline time. Nevertheless, I'm ready for a coin toss.