deep run

"I hope the Chiefs beat the donkeys next week, and I hope the Raiders win one playoff game! That way, Denver is out of the playoffs, like they deserve and then the Raiders will have to give up 2 first round draft picks for Carson Palmer! 2012 and 2013. Hope you think you have a decent team b/c your draft is gone next year and potentially in 2013 too. Not to mention, the Raiders do not look to be a serious threat to anyone in the playoffs. Anything can happen, but thier D is too weak to survive a deep run." (a Chiefs fan's comment.)

The last "deep run" is interesting in a couple of ways.
No. 1, "run" here means a play-off run. Is it like running for an office or election?
No. 2, You say "deep" for going in the run for a long time. There are a couple of rounds. Starting with the wild card weekend, then divisional playoffs, conference championships, and finally, the Super Bowl. The more you go, the deeper you get, but at the same time it seems to me teams are going up in the ladder you win (as sometimes indicated graphically in a tournament). As I am writing this and searching the name for the picture for the tournament (a tournament bracket?), I found another (or a more fundamental) cultural difference in conceptualizing the tournament.

Look at the two tournament brackets from Japan and the US. Many Japanese ones have the winner on the top (and often crowned) whereas All most all US ones are lined sideways. There must be a couple of reasons for this, primary being Japanese allows top-to-down writing system. (I said "many Japanese ones" and it's another interesting cultural topic, that is, the Japanese system is "being invaded" by the European style recently. I see more sideway tournament brackets than I expected, used for (more recently getting popular) soccer tournaments, etc.)

So this makes sense. "Running deep" in a tournament is natural and doesn't really clash in English (you just have to abandon downward directionality) whereas to my Japanese brain, it clashes with my bottom-to-up conceptualization of the tournament, making the expression "run deep" sound strange.

By the way the Raiders won 16-13 overtime in KC, still keeping a faint hope for the playoffs.