January sucks. It’s cold as hell, and for many of us it’s a reminder that we spent yet another 12 months not doing any of the things we set out to do. We reevaluate our career trajectories. We reevaluate our finances. We reevaluate our waistlines. Chiefs fans do all of these things, plus one: we reevaluate why our team doesn’t win games in January (here’s a hint: of the franchise’s nine playoff victories, eight were piloted by quarterbacks now in the Hall of Fame). It isn’t bittersweet. It’s just bitter.



There is, however, a lot of great football that gets played in January, and with enough beer and a little forced forgetfulness, there’s still some enjoyment to be culled from watching it. I caught most of this year’s postseason action, and I gotta say, I dug it. There were some solid football games played, and aside from Wild Card Weekend’s Rookie Bowl, I cared about the outcome of every contest. I’ll get to this weekend’s festivities in a moment, but first I’d like to ponder a bit on a few of my favorite moments from three of the past four weeks. In reverse order:

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I held off writing this season’s final game review in hopes that an announcement would be made regarding the vacant head coach position. By now everybody knows that Romeo Crennel has been given the job. I’ve made no secret that this is what I wanted. It was the right decision.

I’m not void of reservations, however. In three games as head coach for the Kansas City Chiefs, Romeo Crennel’s offense averaged 13 points a game. That was par for the course for the 2011 Chiefs, who averaged 13.3 points a game during Todd Haley’s tenure. Those numbers are unacceptable. Wanna win games? You need to consistently score double that figure. (more…)

With Saturday’s loss to the Oakland Raiders, the 2011 Chiefs were officially eliminated from playoff contention. In the grand scheme of things, this is meaningless. The 2011 Chiefs were officially eliminated from Super Bowl contention on September 11, when they chose to begin yet another season with Matt Cassel at the helm. You’d think by now I’d be done criticizing a guy that hasn’t played since mid November. Well, I’m not. I want to root for a winner.

I remember a fair amount of minutia from many Chiefs games of the past decade, but I only have vivid visual recollections of a few. I wish I only remembered the wins, but I don’t. While I, like you, would love to erase the memory of the Vermeil era Colts Wild Card game, the Damon Huard/Brandon Carr shutout by the Panthers, and the 2003 loss to the Bengals that shattered the Chiefs’ undefeated record as well as Mike Maslowski’s knee, the one I’d least want to relive was the 2002/’03 Week 17 Monsoon Bowl scoreless outing against the Raiders. (more…)

Aaron Rodgers is having the best season an NFL quarterback ever had. Don’t take my word for it. Google it. Kurt Warner and Tom Brady said it, not me. Mind you, they said it before Rodgers was dismantled by Romeo Crennel’s defense last Sunday, but I doubt either would revert their position now (particularly Brady, who knows better than any other quarterback the value of a Crennel D). As it stands, four quarterbacks ostensibly have a shot at taking down Dan Marino’s high water mark for single season passing yards. Given that Rodgers is bringing up the rear of the ostensible list, one could reasonably surmise he’s not even having the best 2011 season of any QB, let alone the nine decades of seasons prior.

What, then, is Rodgers doing that’s special enough to attract the attention of two signal callers with Hall Of Fame numbers? Easy. He’s burying the competition (current and historical) in passer rating. How exactly is he posting those unearthly numbers? The answer to that is equally easy. He’s throwing a lot of touchdowns and not very many interceptions. He’s throwing so many touchdowns, in fact, that he has an outside chance of breaking Brady’s record setting 50 TDs in a single season. He’s also establishing a foothold by which to chip away at some very key career records. At present, he holds the league record for career passer rating. Next season he’ll threaten Steve Young’s four consecutive seasons of 100.0+ passer rating. If he holds pace, he can fairly set his eyes on his predecessor’s career touchdown mark. (more…)

Immediately after Todd Haley was fired, one thought crossed my mind. I couldn’t wait to see what the future would hold for the Chiefs. So on Christmas Eve Eve I realized I shouldn’t wait, when I could simply finish that time machine I tried to make for my 4th grade science fair project. I always figured this was something I could flesh out in an afternoon, so why not now?

I delved deep into my parents basement, past broken garden gnomes and leather gimp suits, until I found a small canopy lined with a thick layer of dust and dead bugs. I swept it off, and there it was just as I left it…. The Time-inator! I sucked at naming things then. (more…)

At 4-3, this thing seemed imminently winnable, didn’t it? With Jason Campbell out, Tim Tebow in, and Philip Rivers doing his impersonation of David Caruso’s career, the AFC West seemed, in a word, surmountable (never mind that a playoff berth would have only resulted in another mercy killing at the hands of Tyler Palko’s old backup, Joe Flacco). Looking back at the list of mostly backup signal callers that gave the Chiefs their handful of victories this season, the 1-5 interim stretch feels closer to on point.

I intentionally used the word “gave” because I can’t recall a single instance where I thought the Chiefs’ offense played well enough for four consecutive quarters to merit a win. Even Trent Dilfer’s Super Bowl Ravens squad that anchors the ever triter “defense wins championships” mantra topped 30 points about once a month. The 2011 Chiefs haven’t done it yet. Who do we blame for that? In the wake of head coach Todd Haley’s dismissal Monday morning, it’s easy to focus much of it in his direction. (more…)

I began my endeavor into sportswriting a few years back by lampooning a couple of guys I didn’t like: alleged Chiefs head coach Herm Edwards and Cubs relief pitcher Bob Howry. Some of you may remember the former. I found them while clearing out an old hard drive this week. I had a nice little time reading them and recalling what it was like to write unencumbered by pesky minutia like logic and truth and ethics.

The bad news is that I think I was a better writer then than I am now. The good news is that, while I do now feel the need to act with some degree of integrity, inside of the boundaries of not blatantly making shit up, I do still get to say whatever I want. Lots of writers don’t get that freedom. Sure, it doesn’t always pay great, but I’ll bet I sleep better drink less enjoy life more get better trim get less hate mail than Bob Gretz. (more…)

The picture on the front page of nfl.com right now is of a player named Houston bringing down Tim Tebow. In principle, that sounds great to me. Unfortunately, it’s not Justin Houston, but rather Oakland defensive end Lamarr Houston.

Anticipate seeing a lot more of that next season. With San Diego faltering, the teams in the AFC West that will get national media attention will be those two–Denver and Oakland. Why Denver? Because soap operas always play well on network television. Why Oakland? Because they’re good. I hate it. You hate it. Pretty much everybody outside of the Bay Area hates it.

Hating it doesn’t make it any less true. (more…)

In August, 2010, I summed up the second half of the Chiefs’ second preseason game with three words: Tyler Palko sucked. I doubt I could find more accurate words than those to sum up Monday night’s affairs. Palko did a lot to reaffirm exactly why it is he’s been bounced from team to team across multiple leagues. The results were hardly a surprise for me. I doubt they were for you either.

Would Ricky Stanzi have been better? I don’t know. I haven’t seen enough of him to make that assessment. I have, however, seen enough of Matt Cassel to make an assessment of him, and I’m confident in saying this: Cassel would not have been better. Say what you will about Tyler Palko. At least he tried to play quarterback. (more…)

Two weeks ago, at 4-3 and tied for the top spot in the AFC West, the Chiefs looked like a miracle in the making. Shutting out the Raiders on their own turf helped purge the painful memories of mid-September and the Revenge of the Jilted Coordinators. It was easy to overlook exactly what those four victories were: a game of mercy with a failing veteran QB, a game of mercy with a failing young QB, the slaughter of a QB three days into his 2011 season (along with his doofus benchwarmer), and a one in a million lucky break on a botched snap.

Today, at 4-5, the miracle is that they even won those four. Losing back to back games to legitimate Suck4Luck contenders really puts things back into perspective. I’m trying my hardest to not be unduly critical, but I’m angry. I look at Kansas City’s depth chart and I don’t see a team that should be scoring so little and conceding so much. Going into November, if there were two must-win games on the Chiefs’ schedule, these were it. (more…)