KANSAS CITY, Mo. — When the Chiefs were trudging along at 4-4 entering their game against Green Bay, we were struck by the question of how much their funk was about inexplicably plummeting into a crummy team and how much was about twists of fortune.
Or maybe it was somewhere in between — considering the uncharacteristic blooper reel of blunders such as the one at Baltimore in the form of the first lost fumble of Clyde Edwards-Helaire's career that might as easily have been recovered by a Chief.
The scenario reminded me of something I was told last season by my longtime friend Rich Keefe, the former director of sports psychology at Duke University and author of a book on the psychology of peak athletic performance called "On The Sweet Spot: Stalking The Effortless Present."
With the Chiefs seeking their second straight Super Bowl berth, we spoke about the psychology of trying to repeat. The conversation led to him making this point:
"When the absolute winner is declared, they're there on the basis of being really good plus chance events. So that means the next year they could be just as good and not have those chance events work out on a couple things and then they fall back.
"So it's not really that they weren't as good; they just didn't have the things going for them that they need to win."
That seemed to apply as the Chiefs stood at a clear crossroads even a week after a weak 20-17 win over the wretched Giants (4-13).
So we wondered if their luck, and perhaps thus their direction, might be turning since the Packers would be playing without star quarterback Aaron Rodgers after he tested positive for COVID-19.
Indeed, the Chiefs won 13-7, making for their first "winning streak" of the season ... on the way to winning nine of their last 10 entering their AFC wild-card round game against the Steelers (9-7-1) on Sunday night at Arrowhead Stadium.
The Chiefs may or may not have beaten the Packers with Rodgers, but no doubt his absence was part of how they won that day.
Meanwhile, though, the most serendipitous thing that happened for the Chiefs that week was more subtle in the moment. Since Pittsburgh coach Mike Tomlin said he prefers volunteers to "hostages," the Chiefs were able to acquire 32-year-old Melvin Ingram from the Steelers for a 2022 sixth-round draft pick.
In the process of reeling in what was essentially a Steelers giveaway, and we'll come back to that, the Chiefs hit the lottery — making for yet another reflection of the relentlessness of general manager Brett Veach and his staff to help engineer such breaks.
That added dimension perhaps was most conspicuous last week against Denver, when Ingram blasted the ball loose from former Chargers teammate Melvin Gordon to spring Nick Bolton to a game-winning 86-yard scoop-and-score.
"That's why we brought Melvin over here — to make plays like that," quarterback Patrick Mahomes said after the game.
But Ingram's presence since joining the Chiefs for the Green Bay game has been a critical part of the defensive reset that helped change the trajectory of the season. He's brought with him the sort of tangible and intangible presence that coach Andy Reid earlier this season said had "upped everybody's game. That's what I think happened."
That's because the chiseled and agile 6 — foot-2, 247-pound defensive end has fortified his turf, effectively transformed two positions at once and influenced everyone around him with what Reid recently called a "phenomenal" attitude.
While defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo said Thursday that the Chiefs were "trending" this way, anyway, it was Ingram's considerable impact that enabled the Chiefs to move Chris Jones back inside to his more natural, and dominant, terrain.
Meanwhile, Spagnuolo notes the traits that have been infectious: being a great teammate, his grasp of the game, his physicality and "angriness" on the field and even that he's "wide-eyed" in the meeting rooms.
His commitment to preparation and sheer feel for the game, safety Tyrann Mathieu said, mean Ingram often seems able to "anticipate what's coming." And his engagement with teammates on both sides of the ball, Mathieu added, reflects how he understands the importance of meshing in and contributing to the chemistry.
Moreover, there's a certain added benefit to his presence this week: Because thanks to the trade, the Chiefs won't be going against a player that Mahomes always had to account for during AFC West games when Ingram was with the Chargers.
"He understands how to play the game, he's going to play it the right way, and he's a mismatch out there," Mahomes said Wednesday. "He's just as good in the run as he is against the pass, and so he can play every single down. He can go out there and play with his presence and kind of bring everybody along."
Or as tight end Travis Kelce laughed and put it after years of trying to block Ingram: "Man, I'm glad he's on our team, I'll tell you that much."
Not just because he doesn't have to face him now, though.
Even from across the locker room or across the line, Kelce has a keen sense of how Ingram has catalyzed the unit.
"Swag champ, man: You bring a guy with that much juice and that much swagger about himself, a perennial all-star throughout his entire career, that makes everybody play better," Kelce said. "And you saw it immediately (in) how much more fun the guys were having.
"Not that we weren't on that track to getting better. I do believe that. We had a lot of guys who were figuring it out both offensively and defensively. (But) sure enough when he came in, it was kind of like, yeah, everybody started clicking even more."
Which begs the question all the more why this wasn't the case in Pittsburgh, where Ingram signed after last season (even as the Chiefs were trying to do so but were unable to come to financial terms at the time).
Since he's been here, Ingram rarely has been available to the media and has offered scant insight about why he was disgruntled beyond the obvious notion that he wanted to play more than he was largely behind T.J. Watt and Alex Highsmith.
"The situation was kind of different," he said at his introductory news conference here. "I ain't into telling lies. It was different. It wasn't what I thought it was going to be. But it's good. It was a dope situation. I respect all those guys. I respect Coach Tomlin, all the coaches, all the players. It was definitely a blessing to be with those guys."
Not the blessing it was for the Chiefs to have the chance at him, though. That's something Tomlin understands, including even in terms of how it enabled the Chiefs to move Jones back inside, but says he couldn't be concerned with at the time.
"We didn't weigh (the Chiefs') circumstances," he told reporters in Pittsburgh days before the Chiefs clobbered the Steelers 36-10 in late December. "We weighed our circumstances."
Fair enough, and, really, the only prism through which the Steelers can operate.
Just the same, Ingram's arrival and fit in Kansas City has proven weighty for the Chiefs, whose dramatic reversal at least coincided with his arrival and certainly informs where they are today.
In a hotly contested and topsy-turvy AFC this season, this is a very good team that nonetheless will have to keep forging its own fortune, not to mention one that could stand the benefit of some chance events, to stay on track toward the franchise's third straight Super Bowl appearance.
It's not just as luck would have it, of course. But it always figures to be part of the equation ... as the Chiefs have seen from all sides over the years and certainly have had reiterated to them this year.
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