
When the Eagles and Chiefs meet in Super Bowl 59 this Sunday, it will only be the twelveth time in the regular season the two teams will meet on the gridiron (including one Super Bowl matchup). Despite the Eagles entering the NFL in 1933, and the Chiefs joining the AFL in 1960 (and becoming part of the NFL/AFL merger), the two teams haven’t played each other often. In fact, there was a 20-year gap between the teams’ first meeting (1972) and their second (1992).
Today we’ll take a look at every regular season (and one Super Bowl) matchup between the two teams, the results and locations. And we’ll ask the question, “Should the Eagles have chosen to wear white jerseys for Super Bowl 59?”
October 22, 1972

Final Score: Eagles 21 – Chiefs 20
Location: Arrowhead Stadium, Kansas City, MO
The Eagles wore white helmets from 1970 through 1973, so this game featured the birds in all-white uniforms. The Chiefs uniforms have changed very little over the years, so even 50+ years ago, the Chiefs looked like the Chiefs.
October 11, 1992

Final Score: Chiefs 24 – Eagles 17
Location: Arrowhead Stadium, Kansas City, MO
It would be 20 years before the two teams would meet again, and this meeting was also in Arrowhead. This time, the Chiefs were victorious. This would also be the last meeting between the two teams before the Eagles would redesign their uniforms, making midnight green their primary color.
September 27, 1998

Final Score: Chiefs 24 – Eagles 21
Location: Veterans Stadium, Philadelphia, PA
Despite playing at home, the Eagles elected to wear white jerseys (probably due to the heat), and the Eagles uniforms underwent their 1996 uniform redesign, so every remaining matchup between the two teams would be in their (more or less) current uniform designs.
November 29, 2001

Final Score: Eagles 23 – Chiefs 10
Location: Arrowhead Stadium, Kansas City, MO
The Eagles went with white jerseys over white pants for this matchup in Kansas City. Note the pants striping on the Eagles — thin black/thick green/thin black. In 2003, this would change to the midnight green/black stripe the team currently sports.
October 2, 2005

Final Score: Eagles 37 – Chiefs 31
Location: Arrowhead Stadium, Kansas City, MO
The Eagles second trip to Arrowhead in the 2000s would have the Eagles wearing white jerseys over midnight green pants. And the Eagles would notch another road victory.
September 27, 2009

Final Score: Eagles 34 – Chiefs 14
Location: Lincoln Financial Field, Philadelphia, PA
Although this game was played in Philadelphia, the Eagles elected to wear white at home again, and this time with green pants. This game would be the sixth consecutive meeting between the two teams where the Chiefs wore red jerseys, and the Eagles wore white.
September 19, 2013

Final Score: Chiefs 26 – Eagles 16
Location: Lincoln Financial Field, Philadelphia, PA
This would be the first game in which the Eagles would wear green jerseys against KC. This game took place after Nike became the NFL uniform supplier, and in so doing, the Chiefs moved their TV numbers from their sleeves to the shoulders. As a result, with the exception of the Eagles wearing black socks, this game is basically the same uniform matchup as Sunday’s Super Bowl 59 will be.
September 17, 2017

Final Score: Chiefs 27 – Eagles 20
Location: Arrowhead Stadium, Kansas City, MO
Although the Eagles still wore black undersocks for this game, you can see the beginnings of the trend towards pairing their white socks with white pants here.
October 3, 2021

Final Score: Chiefs 42 – Eagles 30
Location: Lincoln Financial Field, Philadelphia, PA
The 2021 meeting between these two teams was a shootout, with the Chiefs prevailing on the road. With the exception of the Eagles hosiery, this would be another uniform “preview” of their first Super Bowl meeting (2023) and this year’s rematch.
February 12, 2023

Final Score: Chiefs 38 – Eagles 35
Location: State Farm Stadium, Glendale, AZ
The penultimate time these two teams met on the gridiron was for Super Bowl 57, which followed the 2022 NFL season. Both teams will basically look like this again on Sunday for Super Bowl 59.
November 20, 2023

Final Score: Eagles 21 – Chiefs 17
Location: Arrowhead Stadium, Kansas City, MO
Last season’s meeting featured the Eagles going white over white (with white hosiery), but it was still a pretty good looking game.
And there you have it. All the time the Chiefs and Eagles have met during the regular season and playoffs.
• If you’re scoring at home, the Chiefs lead the all-time series 6-5.
• When wearing red jerseys, the Chiefs are 3-5 overall against the Eagles.
• When wearing white jerseys, the Chiefs are undefeated (3-0) against the Eagles, including a victory in Super Bowl 57.
The Chiefs will be in their white jerseys for Super Bowl 59. Either they will run their streak to 4-0 vs. the Eagles in green jerseys (and in the process, become the first team to “three-peat” in the SB), or the Eagles will break the winless streak against the Chiefs in white tops. Something’s gotta give.
Obviously, the Eagles are not a uni-superstitious team, or they might have chosen to wear white jerseys for Sunday’s game. On the other hand, they’re 3-0 in the playoffs this year in green/green/white/white, so they’re riding that uni streak. Maybe it’ll be successful this time around.
If you were the Eagles, would you have chosen to wear green or white for Super Bowl 59?
Fascinating– but I’m going to bring up the overlooked subject of the anthracite stripe. When the Eagles adopted their current design, I thought I’d spotted a mistake: the stripes on the white pants seemed to be of equal width, but on the green pants, the white stripe is much too thin. Was Philadelphia trying to color-compensate, or was I missing something? It turns out, the pants have *three* stripes, and the width of stripes #2 and 3 combined is equal to stripe #1. The order of the colors on white background is black/anthracite/green, and on the green; black/white/ anthracite. It is hard to see, especially for someone as red/green colorblind as me.
C – should have gone retro kelly green ones.
I’m sure you’re aware that the Eagles (and all NFL teams) are forbidden from wearing alternate uniforms in the playoffs. (Yes, there have been some exceptions in the past, like the 1994 49ers in their “1955 throwbacks” and the Rams also allowed to wear throwbacks). But their fairly longstanding rule is only primary uniforms in the playoffs.
And in both those cases the teams had essentially been allowed to adopt their throwbacks as the standard uniform already during the regular season. Was more an extension of the exemption than a special exemption for the playoffs / SB.
You may notice in 1972 the Chiefs are wearing their white road socks with their red jerseys
I was hoping last week that Philadelphia would announce they were wearing white jerseys but alas. And 20 years between playing one another? That seems way too long. I wonder if that’s the longest gap in post-merger NFL history. I’d look into this but it’s almost my bedtime.
Yo, Phil! Quick grammatical change, on the second line of your intro paragraph: The adjective for twelve becomes “twelfth.” In a cross reference of two of my many interests, pop music history, I checked the spelling of Johnny Mathis’ 1957 hit song “Twelfth of Never.”
Or, you could resort to the Associated Press Style Book and make it “12th.” OK, grammar/style cop shutting up.
Love the photo of Fred Barnett in mid-stride!
To the current Iggles’ credit, I am glad that they aren’t playing into the superstitious jersey game. That said, too bad we couldn’t jump into the time machine to January 1981, when the super-sleeved Eagles – who chose their road whites for the NFC Championship Game at the Vet – forced the Cowboys to wear their “bad luck blue” tops, sent Dallas home with a 20-7 loss and ultimately into its blue jersey redesign. But, Philly didn’t choose the same jersey karma for Super Bowl XV stuck with the green jerseys as the home team and lost to the Raidahs in the drab Superdome.
Jersey karma or not, nobody was spoiling Oakland’s descent on New Orleans: Rod Martin’s three interceptions, John Matuszak’s attacks on Jaworski and Montgomery, and Tom Flores’ offensive game plan that turned Kenny King’s backfield catch into an 80-yard TD and crowned Jim Plunkett’s comeback season by earning game MVP honors.
Yawn. Another NFL article that starts with an icy-white uni…
Actually, those Philly all whites from 1972 look pretty good. Given the similarity of the black and midnight green, they are perhaps the 1 team I wouldn’t mind rolling out a white helmet and an icy white look – and ditching the black.
Agreed, I’d like to see a white helmet and white set to throwback to that uni set.
If the Eagles end up winning the Supe, sadly it would mean that Midnight Green is here to stay forever
They already won the Super Bowl wearing midnight green.
And since the team changed the tiny “Eagles” wordmark on the front of their jerseys last year, that actually counts as a uniform redesign. So they’ll be wearing midnight green for at least another four seasons. So it’ll be at least 30 years in that design before they could get a new one. (2028 season would be the earliest).
If the price of an Eagles Super Bowl is a few more years of midnight green, so be it.
Eagles uniforms are not good
Helmet to socks. Dogshit.