Burning Questions: Chiefs vs. Broncos

And here I thought last week’s loss to the Chargers was the bottom.  Not so fast!

The Kansas City Chiefs got completely manhandled in every phase of the game and blown out of their own building by the Denver Broncos 44-13.  All of a sudden the Chiefs victory over the Super Bowl champs feels like it was years ago.

This is a team that will drive you crazy when the play well, so you can imagine how much my head was spinning after this disaster of a football game.

A fake punt?  On your own 28?  Really??

Saying the Chiefs offense wasn’t effective in the first half would be very kind.  And I and the first person to stand up and applaud when a coach has the guys to step outside the box to try and jump start his team.  But this wasn’t stepping out of the box, this was jumping out of the box and off the roof.

I’ve found myself defending Haley this year with “If it would have worked he’d be a genius!”, and I stick by every one of those arguments.  But not here.  Even if Brodie Croyle is able to get the ball to Thomas Gafford for the first down, it’s not a good play.  Short of being down three touchdowns and needing a miracle, there is never a good reason to go for it that deep in your own territory.

The offense may have been pathetic, but Kansas City still only found themselves down by 8 points.  You don’t take those sort of gambles when the game is that close.

As for the play itself, it’s brilliant.  I didn’t even know the center could be eligible on a pass play and judging by the coverage, neither did the Broncos.  It was a beautifully drawn up play that wasn’t executed.  The funny thing is that it doesn’t matter that it wasn’t executed.  What matters is that it never should have come down to the backup quarterback trying to complete a 4th down pass to the long snapper in a one score game.

Was Matt Cassel benched or simply taken out of harm’s way?

In the postgame Q&A, Todd Haley said the game was out of hand (that’s putting it mildly) and it was a good time to get Brodie Croyle some snaps.  While it’s hard to argue with either of those points, it’s also impossible to deny that Cassel looked terrible the past two weeks.

Does he continue to have to deal with receivers that drop passes that are perfectly placed?  Absolutely.  But he also overthrew Bobby Wade on a sure touchdown and missed badly on just as many passes as were dropped.

When you boil it down, Cassel may have been benched, but it doesn’t matter as this team moves forward.

Short of an injury or complete implosion by Cassel (Yes, worse than these two weeks) there is almost no chance that the Kansas City Chiefs start anyone at quarterback.  It possible they jumped the gun with Cassel when they decided to give him a huge contract extension.  But we know that Brodie Croyle and Matt Gutierrez aren’t the QBOTF in Kansas City and you simply cannot say that about Cassel yet.

There is no QB controversy in Kansas City and there will not be one until Scott Pioli puts more talent around him and Todd Haley is able to properly evaluate his abilities to run a football team.

How long before Tamba Hali gets a new contract?

Under normal circumstances I would be in no hurry to lock up a player long term, especially one playing for a team that will be lucky to win 5 games.  Clearly these aren’t normal circumstances and once the Chiefs put better talent around Hali next season, he could explode and he will cost twice what they could sign him for now.

Hali was an absolute monster against the Broncos and on a day the Chiefs were honoring Derrick Thomas, he looked a whole lot like the hall of famer.  Now that’s not to say Hali is ever going to be anywhere near as good as DT, but as we found out after trading away Jared Allen, pass rushers do not grow on trees.  Right now Hali is pressuring quarterbacks every single week with very little help from the players around him.  This week he did it against one of he best young left tackles in Ryan Clady and made it look easy.

There are very few players currently playing in Kansas City that you look at and know the Chiefs could build around.  Hali is one of them and he needs to be locked up sooner rather than later or we could be looking at another ugly JA situation.

Tags: Denver Broncos, Matt Cassel, Tamba Hali, Todd Haley