Silence of the Rams

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Tomorrow's match-up marks the 17th meeting (both preseason and regular season) between the Chiefs and Rams since the Rams moved to St. Louis following the 1994 season. This "Governor's Cup" for Missouri football bragging-rights has never meant so much. As Mitch Holthus, voice of the Chiefs, said it "maybe the biggest game in seven years" for Kansas City.

It's been rare since the Rams moved to St. Louis that both of Missouri's NFL teams are good, let alone in first place of their respective divisions. Below I've put a chart that shows just how each season has turned out for both the Chiefs and the Rams since 1995. As you can see, the Rams and the Chiefs haven't shared success very often; only once has Kansas City and St. Louis made it to the playoffs the same year. Both teams, however, have shared losing as of late.

Year	Chiefs	Rams
1995	13-3	7-9
1996	9-7	6-10
1997	13-3	5-11
1998	7-9	4-12
1999	9-7	13-3
2000	7-9	10-6
2001	6-10	14-2
2002	8-8	7-9
2003	13-3	12-4
2004	7-9	8-8
2005	10-6	6-10
2006	9-7	8-8
2007	4-12	3-13
2008	2-14	2-14
2009	4-12	1-15

Now I'm not going to sit here and try to convince you that there is some correlation between when the Chiefs and Rams play that equals which team makes it to the playoffs. However, I am going to lay out some facts and let you decide for yourself if all your statistics professors were wrong and in this specific case correlation equals causation.

Since 1995, the Chiefs and the Rams have met in the regular season just four times. Of those four times, the Chiefs have won all of them. Two of those times, Kansas City was in playoff contention. The first was in 1997, when the Chiefs won 28-20. The Chiefs then went on to go 13-3 and made the playoffs. In 2006, the Chiefs and Rams last regular season meeting, Kansas City won 31-17. Both teams were in the playoff hunt at the time. That year, the Chiefs finished 2nd in the AFC West with a 9-7 record and made the wild card spot. That year was also the last time the Chiefs have had a winning record. The Rams would go on to finish 8-8, one game behind Seattle for first.

This game between the top of the AFC West and the NFC West is very important to both teams, but probably more important to Kansas City. Chiefs can't lose and still have a legitimate shot at the playoffs; St. Louis can. Both teams want this game, and although Kansas City has had more success this year, they are not necessarily the favorites. Kansas City has lost all of their back-to-back road games this year, and after coming off a loss at San Diego, they are in danger of doing it again.

Todd Haley reiterated that stopping the running game of St. Louis is the number one priority. St. Louis's running back Steven Jackson has 1,081 yard rushing this season with 4 touchdowns. Of course, we all know that Kansas City is the number one rushing team in the league. Matt Cassel has been doing extraordinarily well most of this season and is a big reason why the Chiefs are where they are at. Sam Bradford, St. Louis's rookie quarterback, is also having a superb season (2,884 passing yards, 17 touchdowns to 12 interceptions). And both teams have significantly improved on defense (Steve Spagnoulo has brought the Eagles blitz scheme with him wherever he coaches). The Rams are 2-1 against the AFC West this season while the Chiefs are 3-0 against the NFC West.

This year's Governor's Cup is going to be an all out Missouri Civil War. These two teams are young, hungry for victory, and ready to make it to the playoffs (most of the players on both teams have never been). The result for the Chiefs could mean a one game lead over the Chargers with two games to go or it could mean the end of our playoff aspirations. I think the Chiefs are going to win this game; the margin of victory, however, might be closer than I'm comfortable predicting.