PITTSBURGH, Pa. — Patrick Mahomes, Travis Kelce and the Kansas City Chiefs were able to check one more accomplishment off of their list of regular-season goals on Christmas Day as they improved to 15-1 on the year.
Maybe more importantly, by virtue of their 29-10 victory on Wednesday over the Steelers, Andy Reid’s Chiefs clinched the top seed in the AFC’s playoff bracket, and a first-round playoff bye; the win also means that KC will play all of their postseason games leading up to Super Bowl LIX at Arrowhead Stadium.
Photo courtesy Kansas City Star
From a sports and entertainment business perspective, the NFL’s Christmas Day doubleheader streaming on the Netflix app was quite notable on a number of different levels. To the average fan, most important of all was essentially what was missing from Wednesday’s holiday showcase games: that being the myriad and seemingly endless buffering issues and crashes that unforgettably- and regrettably- plagued the much-ballyhooed and maligned fight between former two-time heavyweight Champion Mike Tyson and content creator Jake Paul in November.
The Chiefs’ 29-10 win over the Steelers was also notable in that it marked the second-most-streamed live sports event on Netflix after the a fore mentioned Tyson-Paul bout last month, and was viewed in more than 200 countries, according to Netflix provided data.
While the Tyson-Paul exhibition event 40 days prior was marred by a large number of unhappy subscribers who quickly and loudly took to social media to post complaints regarding the few hiccups they experienced, Wednesday’s pair of week 16 games actually went so smoothly that they left many on Sports Twitter musing and/or openly predicting that it won’t be much longer before we actually see a Netflix-produced Super Bowl in the near future; although that likely would have to wait until the current rights deals expire after the 2033 season (unless the NFL unexpectedly decides to exercise its opt-out at the conclusion of the 2029 season.
