Chiefs fans in ‘No Man’s Land’ remain resilient in Broncos, Cowboys territory
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Editor’s Note: This is a dispatch from our Red Kingdom Road Trip. We’re connecting with Chiefs fans across the country ahead of the Super Bowl — share your story with us using this form. Read more from our journey to Las Vegas for the Super Bowl here on KansasCity.com, in our newsletters, or on The Star’s Instagram.
Our motley crew left Liberal, Kansas, bright and early Monday morning and crossed into Oklahoma, where we stopped for a photo shoot with Pat, Trav and Taylor in front of the “Welcome to Oklahoma” sign.
It wasn’t long before truckers blared their horns in appreciation.
After our brief pit stop, we hit the road again, coasting along the flat, low plains of the Oklahoma panhandle before landing in the small town of Guymon.
Here, we found a small but mighty outpost of Chiefs Kingdom.
The fandom in ‘No Man’s Land’
Three years ago, Elizabeth Brown suffered a major stroke.
She couldn’t speak, and was immediately rushed to a hospital about 100 miles away. As her husband packed her bag, he stuffed in something that might seem odd to others: her beloved Travis Kelce jersey.
It was playoff season, after all. And as Elizabeth, now 36, recovered, cheering on the Chiefs helped boost her spirits.
“It was nice to be able to have a real moment when you’re going through such challenging times,” she said. “Football and the Kansas City Chiefs have always been that escape, that fun, and the memories that you can hold onto.”
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Elizabeth has been a part of Chiefs Kingdom since she was in high school in Guymon, Oklahoma, when her high school sweetheart and now-husband Tanner “roped her in.”
Since then, she’s become a die-hard fan, driving up with Tanner for games and tailgates, crocheting Chiefs-themed sweaters for her dogs, and even recruiting her mom to Chiefs Kingdom — with a little persuasion in the form of Sooner legend Creed Humphrey.
In rural Guymon — population 11,442 — where Elizabeth has lived her whole life, fan allegiances lie mostly with the Dallas Cowboys and the Denver Broncos.
But Chiefs Kingdom burns strong here — and for one very particular reason, she said.
“Kansas City has always been the underdog, and the people out here pride themselves on being resilient,” she said.
Keeping a family tradition
As a kid growing up in Topeka, Sundays were reserved for working on the farm in Philip Rineberg’s household. But they were also meant for blasting Mitch Holthus’ play-by-plays of Kansas City Chiefs games over the radio.
“We’d be clipping on barbed wire on the fence, and our dad would yell at us, ‘Hey, Chiefs got a touchdown,’ and we’d go down the line, ‘What’s the score?’ He’d say, ‘Only down by 24,’” Rineberg recalled with a laugh from his office in Guymon, where he now lives.
Rineberg, 29, has been a Chiefs fan his whole life, and he has his family to thank for that. He can still picture the “old, worn-out Chiefs hat” his grandpa put on every morning, and the memories he made attending a 2017 Chiefs-Bills game in a nasty blizzard with his brother.
Sure, the winning has been nice in recent years, he said. But even when the Chiefs were mired in losing, it was always the fans who brought him back.
“We could be 3-13 and you’d never know,” Rineberg said. “You’d still think we were competing for the Super Bowl. Being a Chiefs fan is all about the fans and that community.”
Deep in the heart of Texas
We made it to Patrick Mahomes’ home state of Texas so we of course had to stop for a photo to celebrate Flat Pat’s return. Next stop: QB1’s college town of Lubbock, Texas.
Connected to the Kingdom 6,000 miles away
Kansas City native William Nealy has been a Chiefs fan since before he was born — literally.
“(My mom) went to watch the Chiefs practice at the old practice grounds, and a lot of the future hall of famers signed a football for her and me (about to be born),” Nealy shared. “Now I watch these games as a middle aged man while video calling with my mom.”
It’s a shared connection that spans more than 6,000 miles: Nealy now lives with his wife and two sons in Tokyo, Japan, and tunes in to whatever streaming platform is showing the faraway games.
And how’s this for a coincidence — Nealy and his family live just a ten-minute walk from the Tokyo Dome, where Taylor Swift is scheduled to perform the night before the Super Bowl. (The Embassy of Japan in Washington, D.C., confirmed last week that the singer should be able to make it back to Vegas for the game.)
“The Chiefs mainly (are) my lifeline to my mom and my hometown,” Nealy told The Star. “Chiefs is pretty much synonymous with family for me.”
Takes dedication to be Chiefs fan in Eagles territory
Lifelong Chiefs fan Mark Harkins of Middletown, Pennsylvania, shared a photo of himself as a child in a replica Chiefs helmet circa 1972 in Augusta, Georgia.
“Back then you couldn’t buy NFL gear in the Sears catalog, so I had to settle for a plain red helmet that my older brother used his model paints to paint a ‘KC Arrowhead’ on the side for me,” Harkins recalled.
“For many years, we laughed about how Christmas dinner in ‘71 was delayed for the end of that famous Chiefs/Dolphins OT game,” he added. “Grandma ALWAYS served dinner right at 6, except for that Christmas. She wanted to see the end of the game!!”
After decades of supporting the Chiefs, he’s excited to see the team’s recent success — despite never having lived in Kansas City himself.
“Being born in 1969, I was 50 when we finally won another Super Bowl,” he recalls. “Staying a fan in Pennsylvania among all the Eagles and Steelers fans finally paid off.”
Join the Red Kingdom Road Trip
We want to highlight how much fans across the country love the Chiefs, because we know how much they mean to Kansas City. So, help us find you along the way to the Super Bowl. Share your story here.
Keep following our trip here on KansasCity.com and on Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook. Here’s where we’ll be stopping over the next several days:
Lubbock, Texas, on Tuesday, Feb. 6
Albuquerque, New Mexico, on Wednesday, Feb. 7
Scottsdale, Arizona, on Thursday, Feb. 8
Sedona, Arizona, on Friday, Feb. 9
Flagstaff, Arizona, on Friday, Feb. 9
Las Vegas, Nevada, on Friday, Feb. 9
