The 2022 NFL season is in the books and a Super Bowl champion has been crowned. Much to the Cincinnati Bengals' chagrin, the Kansas City Chiefs are hoisting the Lombardi Trophy.
Fortunately, there is some good to come out of this. As we all know, the reigning Super Bowl champion gets to host the first regular-season game of the following season and it just so happens that the Bengals will be heading to Kansas City in the 2023 regular-season.
This HAS to be the 2023 opener.
The Bengals have a road game at Kansas City next year.
— Dan Hoard (@Dan_Hoard) February 13, 2023
Has the Thursday night, September 7th NFL season opener written all over it
The NFL must schedule Bengals vs Chiefs as Week 1 season-opener
This feels way too easy. The Bengals and Chiefs are now officially rivals after KC knocked off the stripes in the AFC title game to advance to the Super Bowl and eventually win the whole she-bang. Prior to that, Cincinnati had KC's number, winning three straight games and talking a ton of trash ahead of the AFC Championship Game (which backfired on them).
Every single game between the Chiefs and Bengals since Joe Burrow landed with Cincinnati has been decided by three points. These are must-see games and that's why this has to be the choice for the NFL to open up the 2023 season. There's no other option.