The 2013 K.C. Chiefs: A Great Enigma
By Laddie Morse
The NFL trade deadline is October 29 and if they truly want to make a move towards the Lombardi “this” year, they must make a trade for offensive help. Tony Gonzales appears to be off the market. If the Falcons lose another game in the next two weeks, that may change. Owner Arthur Branch can say one thing but Thomas Dimitroff is a smart GM who knows how to plan for the future. In any event, the Chiefs need offensive help and they need it yesterday.
If the Chiefs could bring in Gonzo then Bowe becomes relevant again. It would be like getting two players for the price of one. No matter what kind of cap gyrations the Chiefs have to create, they must make that deal if at all possible.
Chiefs management manages to call QB Alex Smith a “game manager” and my hope is they can manage to never say manage again.
Some people feel that Alex Smith needs to be replaced. However, unless he gets injured I don’t see him leaving the field for the Chiefs until the start of the 2016 season. Let that sink in. Now, let’s move on from the conversation that has anything to do with replacing him right now.
The offensive line is a mess.
– LT Branden Alberts’s play has ranged from inconsistent to solid this year.
– LG Jeff Allen looks worse than last year and that was a pretty bad year. ProFootballFocus ranked all Guards in the league last year and Allen came in at approxiamtely #79 out of 81.
– C Rodney Hudson is essentially a third year player playing his rookie season and playing like one too.
– RG Jon Asamoah is solid but when he pass blocks he’s so much better than the RT next him that there are big obvious gaping holes in the protection.
– RT Eric Fisher is flat out stinking up the place. In Andrew Kulha’s film breakdown of Fisher vs. the Raiders look at the first two pictures he offers and notice how much further into the backfield Fisher allows his man than RG Jon Asamoah. It’s astonishing. Astonishingly bad!
Yes, the Chiefs need to bolster their offensive line but, I don’t see that happening during the season or prior to the trade deadline. Here’s an explanation of why offensive linemen are the equivalent of “stock market gold” in a recent mock draft so if you’re wondering why they won’t be able to find OL help before the deadline please reference that piece first.
The immediate fix for the offensive line is to start Geoff Schwartz at LG and start Donald Stephenson at RT. Stephenson was as good as Albert has been this year as a replacement at LT last year. Schwartz has already shown me he is better than Allen and for the life of me I can’t see why he’s not starting and Allen is on the bench. I don’t see what Allen’s long term prospects are with this team and, I don’t see a bright future for him in the crystal football. It makes me wonder what Andy Reid sees in him?
What I can see happening is a trade for a wideout. Someone who has fallen out of favor or who may be under used but, definitely someone who has speed and the moves to get open. However, finding a WR who can be a play maker at this time of the year is at best an iffy proposition.
In Sunday’s game vs. the Raiders I noticed a negative pattern being repeated. Alex Smith would roll out to one side or the other ostensibly because the protection has broken down or because of the play design, but all of his receivers were stuck in their routes flowing away from the side Smith was rolling out to and not looking back and paying attention to the story unfolding in the backfield.
I’ve watched the game of football for over 50 years now and I can vividly recall how so many good QBs who had a good rapport with their receivers would instinctively know when they were rolling one way or the other and be there to make a play by mirroring the QB down the sideline.
The Chiefs have no one doing that right now with Alex Smith on a consistent basis. That, I put on Andy Reid. This can be taught. You don’t have to wait for it to mystically appear one day. For a QB who rolls out of pressure as much as Smith does, it’s critical that he gets on the same page with at least one of his receivers. This is a personal pet peeve that drives me nuts because it happens again and again and again… and it doesn’t have to.
I keep hearing, “Give the offense some time to jell,” but I don’t see a progression happening with this offense. Maybe we should blame this on Obama too because, like the economy, it seems to be in a recession. That’s the concern. It’s getting worse not better.
Opportunities to “win it all” don’t come along very often. It’s been since 1994 that the Chiefs had a real chance. The Chiefs are on a roll now but, it looks like that roll runs into a rock in Denver. There’s a lot to like about these 2013 Chiefs but, they just aren’t going to win playoff games the way they are currently constructed — offensively. There’s just too much Jekyll and not enough Hyde. Or is that… too much Hyde and not enough Jekyll? Now see! They’ve got me sucked into the enigma too.
Anyone else a bit puzzled by the perfection of these Chiefs?