Sean Payton discusses Chiefs being out of AFC West race, mentions Chargers

Denver Broncos head coach Sean Payton watched some of the Chiefs and Texans game on Sunday night.

On the team’s flight back from Las Vegas, after dispatching the Raiders, they temporarily lost the television signal.

Payton revealed that nugget on a conference call with reporters on Monday, about 14 hours after Kansas City was officially eliminated from the AFC West. With their 20-10 loss to Houston, the Chiefs won’t win it for the first time since 2016.

“We watched part of the game before the plane took off, lost service. I think it was 10-nothing when the wheels were up. We landed, it was 10-10 and then watched the end of the game,” Sean Payton said.

After taking the division nine years in a row, that dream is dead for Kansas City. At 6-7 it’s not mathematically possible for them to catch the 11-2 Broncos.

“Everything right now has that work in progress sign,” Payton said. “I recognize the question in that the Chiefs’ loss last night eliminated them from winning the division, and yet we have a stretch here with some real good football teams coming in and focusing on what we can do to win the division. The Chargers are very much alive in that battle.”

The 8-4 Chargers play the Philadelphia Eagles on Monday Night Football, so that’s a key result Denver will be monitoring. Remember, Los Angeles holds the tiebreaker and Week 18 still looms, so the Broncos need to keep winning if the Chargers somehow get hot.

But for Sean Payton, much like he said after the win against the Raiders, there’s not a ton of scoreboard watching going on. The Broncos are worried about what they can control.

“The focus gets so inwardly driven to our own team that I recognize that a team that’s won the division for however many straight years won’t be able to win it this year, but it’s more important to focus on, alright, how do we finish this next quarter poll of the season, starting with a real good team in Green Bay,” Sean Payton concluded.

The Packers will come to Empower Field at Mile High on Sunday. Denver would like to win, but even if they don’t, the Chiefs are no longer a threat in the division.

That’s the reality we live in — which is awesome — and even crazier that it happened in early December.

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