Should Kansas City Chiefs Rest Players Against San Diego?
Denny Medley-USA TODAY Sports
Jamaal Charles is one of the best players in the NFL. Some, in fact, believe he deserves to be in the MVP race. I tend to agree.
That’s why it was disappointing to see the Chiefs stray away from Charles in the second half of Sunday’s 7-23 loss to the Indianapolis Colts.
Sure, Kansas City was down, but that doesn’t excuse getting Charles only getting six touches in the second half. He’s one of the most dynamic players in the NFL, and if there was anybody who could have helped Kansas City get back in the game, it would have been him.
The lack of touches for Charles was among the topics head coach Andy Reid discussed on Monday with the media.
“Obviously we’re disappointed with the game,” Reid said. “I think we all could have done a better job, starting with me. But collectively, they got us. We’ll learn from this and we’ll get better from it.”
“We’ve got to eliminate the obvious things, the turnovers and you have to maintain field position when you’re put in a position to do that. When you do have the field position, you need to make sure you get points out of that and we didn’t do a very good job there.”
“Obviously 25 (Jamaal Charles) didn’t touch the ball much the second half and that’s my responsibility to make sure that within the realm of things, 28 plays that we had in that second half, that we give him more of a shot there than the six touches that he had,” Reid said. “As far as going forward here, I haven’t made up my mind exactly how we’re going to play it. I’ve done it a couple of different ways, but we’ll see. We’ll see how we do that. I’ll evaluate all the different situations. I have sat people before, quite a few times actually, and we benefitted from that. But I’ll look at everything and have that part evaluated.”
Denny Medley-USA TODAY Sports
Reid is referring to the fact that Kansas City’s Week 17 clash with the Chargers will mean nothing for the Chiefs. They’ve already locked up a Wild Card spot in the AFC and Denver has locked up the AFC West. Some would say that resting key players for the playoffs would be the smartest move for Reid and the Chiefs against San Diego, and that’s something the coach touched on, saying, “Well if you look at the history of it, it’s about a 50/50 shot over the last three or four years of people that have done it.”
“I think it’s what you feel most comfortable with as a coach. The obvious benefit is that you rest your guys and then you kind of get them back feeling a little bit fresher than they are at the end of the season,” Reid explained. “You take the risk of the timing part of it. Sometimes that’s there, sometimes that’s not. But, those are the things that you have to evaluate.”
What do you think Addicts? Should the Chiefs rest key players against the Chargers?
Sound off below.