On ‘pure grit’ and never-ending wonder of Patrick Mahomes as Chiefs head to Super Bowl

In his first season as the Chiefs’ starting quarterback, Patrick Mahomes was a phenomenon who emerged as the NFL MVP. In his second, he was a sensation who stoked the Chiefs to their first Super Bowl in 50 years.

“It all happened so fast …” he said late Sunday night after the host Chiefs beat the Bengals 23-20 in the AFC Championship Game at GEHA Field at Arrowhead Stadium. “I thought that (was) just kind of how it went.”

Having what he termed “dealt with failure” since then — albeit in the relative sense of having lost the next Super Bowl and fallen in last season’s AFC Championship Game — Mahomes would appreciate winning this one “way more” now that he has a grasp of how elusive this actually is.

Even so, there remains a remarkable common denominator about Mahomes from then to now … and surely into the Feb. 12 Super Bowl showdown with the Philadelphia Eagles in Glendale, Arizona.

Five full seasons into this role now, Mahomes’ capacity to astonish somehow continues to flourish and evolve. Not to mention exhilarate a fan base and buoy a franchise that needed this victory to reassert any claim to perennial contention in the Mahomes Era.

The Chiefs’ victory over Cincinnati on Sunday was about a lot of things: the purging of a three-game losing streak against the Bengals, including in last season’s AFC title game; beautiful redemption for Skyy Moore (his late 29-yard punt return) and Harrison Butker (the game-winning field goal); a blunt statement by Chris Jones (his first two playoff sacks, befitting the AFC defensive player of the year-worthy season he’s enjoyed).

The night also was about what it means now: Andy Reid coaching against the team that fired him 10 years ago — and the former Chiefs assistant coach (Nick Sirianni) Reid didn’t retain when he came here. And, of course, the mind-blowing Kelce Bowl between Chiefs tight end Travis and his brother Jason, the Eagles’ center.

But the undercurrent was another monumental chapter in the legacy of Mahomes that was neatly encapsulated on his 5-yard run — and absorbing of an unnecessary roughness penalty by Joseph Ossai — that enabled Butker’s 45-yard field goal with 3 seconds left.

Watching that play unfold, Chiefs chairman and CEO Clark Hunt said, was like watching “Superman put his cape on.”

Because this was about Mahomes summoning something from deep within after being hobbled by a high-ankle sprain that might have been incapacitating if not for a combination of his heavy mettle and the work of the Chiefs’ athletic training staff.

Assistant athletic trainer “Julie (Frymeyer) WAS the reason i was the guy i was on the field today!” Mahomes wrote on Twitter. “It takes everyone but she (led) the charge all week!!!”

Add it all up, and maybe Reid said it best: “Pure grit.”

“People don’t realize how hurt he was,” general manager Brett Veach said, adding that high-ankle sprains are “terrible injuries” and can keep players out for weeks.

But Mahomes didn’t so much as miss a snap in practice. And the impact of that was far more than just getting in his reps.

“Our players, our team, coaches, we’re all lucky to have him in that position,” Reid said. “And the mindset, that whole mindset, carries over to everybody.”

All the more so as Mahomes persisted even as he clearly tweaked the ankle a couple times, including when he tried to recover his unforced fumble and on a key third-down conversion pass to Mecole Hardman that kept alive a drive (on which the Chiefs retook a 20-13 lead just as they seemed to be fading).

Limping more and more as the game went on, it was almost poetic that this came down to Mahomes seizing the chance to run on third and 4 at the Cincinnati 47 with 17 seconds left … and that moment becoming the gateway to victory.

“Obviously, there were times where you could see it (the ankle) wouldn’t let me do what I wanted to,” he said. “But I was able to do enough on that last play to get the first down.”

To be sure, Mahomes, the MVP favorite again this season, has made dozens of more purely dazzling plays in his career.

From a simply aesthetic standpoint on Sunday, the 14-yard touchdown pass to Kelce (another example of their uncanny wavelength) and 19-yarder to Marquez Valdes-Scantling earlier in the game will be better remembered.

In fact, the pass to MVS perhaps was the most traditional “how did Mahomes do that?” moment of the game. Afterward, Mahomes said, “I couldn’t really see in front of him, so I tried to throw a line drive.”

But maybe Valdes-Scantling had a better explanation.

“He has eyes,” the receiver said, “all over his head.”

So now all eyes will be on Mahomes and the Chiefs again since they’ve finally shrugged off the Bengals albatross.

As well as duly answering the doubters around the nation and the smack talk that came from Bengal players and about everywhere all at once in Cincinnati.

Leading up to the game Sunday, even mayor Aftab Pureval tweeted a proclamation referring to Arrowhead Stadium as “Burrowhead” (in reference to the Cincinnati quarterback) and called for a paternity test to check if Burrow was Mahomes’ father.

“The mayor came at me, man,” Mahomes said, smiling.

Like he did with anyone else coming at him, though, Mahomes had the ultimate answer. Again. And right on time.

Had the Chiefs lost their fourth straight to the Bengals and second in a row at this stage, we’d have been left wondering if they were destined to be one-and-done after their only Super Bowl triumph in half a century.

Instead, he once more set the tone for a new frontier for the Chiefs, who had appeared in only two of the first four Super Bowls before Mahomes arrived.

On this night, even without the burst he might normally have. Even when stopping and cutting were excruciating. And even as the lineup kept churning with injuries to Kadarius Toney, Mecole Hardman and JuJu Smith-Schuster, and Justin Watson already out with an illness.

Really, it was a lot like Hunt had mentioned to Reid earlier in the week: The great ones, he said, “always find a way to get it done, particularly when they’re facing adversity.”

Even five years into this, it remains a rare and precious thing to see … especially since Mahomes keeps finding new ways to demonstrate why left tackle Orlando Brown Jr. calls him “the best in the world at what he does.”

For all his talents, the big arm and the photographic memory, Sunday was a reminder of how it’s all animated by heart. No wonder that when Kelce spoke of Mahomes after the game, his voice seemed to quiver.

“I knew for a fact that he was going to give this city and this organization — all the guys that he goes to work with every single day — everything he has,” Kelce said. “Sure enough, even on that last play, you saw it all come together.

“You guys know how much I love that guy. But it’s moments like that that make it that much more special to be his teammate, and that much more special to be a part of the Kansas City Chiefs organization.”

Especially after Mahomes has “dealt with failure” the last couple seasons.