Glory days of bygone sports teams stick with a man throughout his life. Guys my age in western Missouri remember the moment — where they sat, who was in the room, the whole scenario — when Len Dawson led the Chiefs to a Super Bowl victory.

Of course, that wasn’t me.

I grew up on the eastern side of the state, obliged by geography to root for the St. Louis football Cardinals. It is a burden I bear just short of a therapist’s couch.

My memories are not of great playoff victories, because there were none. The team went three times in 28 years, always playing on the road, always losing. One year, the Cardinals became the first in conference history to win 10 games and not make the playoffs, a dubious honor.

The team had star players. Charley Johnson was a top-flight quarterback in the days when players had separate off-season lives. Two years during his career, he spent time in the active-duty military, and he later got a doctorate in chemical engineering.

Larry Wilson had the reputation as one of the hardest-hitting safeties in football, and his career overlapped briefly with cornerback Roger Wehrli, the pride of King City, Mo. Both are enshrined as Hall of Famers.

Dan Dierdorf, an offensive tackle, also made the Hall of Fame. He played alongside lineman Conrad Dobler, who once told Sports Illustrated that defenders were crazy to facemask him because his teeth were so sharp.

But the Cardinals could never surround themselves with enough good players to sustain success. Most teams chose their first-round draft picks from a “Who’s Who” of college football talent. In St. Louis, they used a list called “Who’s That?”

The Cardinals had the only team song that sounded like a dirge, and it made sense.

Yet people clung to the suffering. The point of fandom is joining a collective experience. That can be success ... or the other thing.

Then, in 1988, the Cardinals left. They packed up and moved to Arizona because St. Louisans would not build a new stadium.

With that, I discovered … well, Sunday afternoons.

Sure, networks always supplied a game, but no duty accompanied it. Neither cheers nor lament could be attached to a team with no proximate or emotional connection.

Life provided diversions other than pro football. Nothing about the next six years made me poorer in spirit.

Then, I moved to St. Joseph and became engrossed in the Chiefs. Sunday afternoons in front of a television, and occasionally at the stadium, seemed familiar and hardly imprisoning.

But I’ve renewed my license for the time off. Last Sunday, with the Chiefs on the field, I had a leisurely lunch, did some shopping, let the afternoon unfold.

The losing doesn’t trouble me. My history with football accommodates suffering.

Being a real fan requires single-mindedness, and my mind drifts these days.

Besides, television blackouts prompted by waning Arrowhead attendance seem certain for later this season. When they happen, I will consider myself prepared.

The secret of life is enjoying the passage of time, James Taylor sings. It’s easy for him. He’s a Patriots’ fan.

Ken Newton’s column runs

on Sunday and Tuesday.