As the Chiefs trudged to the end of another wretched season in 2012, a 2-14 fiasco, Andy Reid’s Philadelphia Eagles were on the way to a similarly miserable finish (4-12).

Each team’s 2012 season, alas, was also underscored by off-field devastation: For the Chiefs, it was inextricably tethered to the horrifying murder of Kasi Perkins by linebacker Jovan Belcher and his subsequent suicide; Reid’s 29-year-old son Garrett had died by an accidental heroin overdose in a dorm room at the Eagles’ Lehigh University pre-season training camp.

The woeful seasons and shattering events were independent in real time. But they would come to gravitate to each other in the uncanny way two forces in need of each other sometimes do … in ways with remarkable ripples toward Super Bowl LVII.

So as we contemplate and appreciate Reid’s decade with the Chiefs culminating with a showdown with the Eagles, let’s start with this:

For many reasons, it might well have gone otherwise after the Chiefs fired Romeo Crennel in favor of hiring their fifth coach since 2005.

Reid had a number of other suitors, particularly Arizona and the Chargers, and he certainly could have gone elsewhere. Or could have considered taking time off.

Or he may even have been able to stay in Philadelphia, if he hadn’t felt he needed a change himself.

We often hear the euphemism about teams and employees mutually agreeing to part ways. But in this case, amid family tragedy and Reid’s tenure having gone stale with restless fans as the Eagles missed the playoffs in back-to-back seasons, that’s at least in part what happened.

That scenario was “exactly right,” Chiefs chairman and CEO Clark Hunt said in a 2013 interview with The Star, adding that Reid “helped convince” owner Jeffrey Lurie that moving on would be great for the Eagles and great for Reid.

“Sometimes,” Hunt said then, “change is good.”

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