Chiefs GM: The 13 Grooviest Moves of John Dorsey PART I

Alright, Kansas City Chiefs General Manager John Dorsey has been around long enough to compile a list of his best moves. I’ll call them his “grooviest” moves. Why “grooviest?” It was 46 years ago this summer that the Super Bowl IV Champion Kansas City Chiefs went to camp and came out on the other end, the best team in the league. It was also 46 years ago this August that Woodstock went down and that was one groovy scene… as I’ve heard tell. Beside, Dorsey was a love-child of the 60’s, born on August 30, 1960.

So many important events happened in 1969. Events that changed our world forever. So much more than the lunar landing and Richard Nixon becoming president. It’s as if 1969 birthed our modern age.

+ That same year the Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) set up a network between two universities (UCLA and the Stanford Research Center) giving birth to what most humans on this planet can now not live without: a personal internet.

+ Boeing 747 jumbo jets graced the American sky for the first time, forever changing the landscape of airspace.

+ That same year Wal-Mart became incorporated and changed the look of Everytown, USA.

+ The microprocessor was invented.

+ The Pontiac Trans Am, the quintessential American muscle car, hits the road.

+ Abroad, the Queen became the Queen (Elizabeth II) and she rules to this very day.

+ PBS (the Public Broadcasting System) was born.

+ Sesame Street hit the airwaves and changed how kids everywhere learn.

All the while, the Kansas City Chiefs were on their own path to a World Championship in football. Not a Lombardi Trophy. 1969 was the last year a “World Championship” trophy was handed out and it wasn’t until the next year, when Lombardi died, that the trophy name changed and the two leagues, the AFL and the NFL, also merged. Funny, at the time, I wasn’t for this move.

Even the most avid Chiefs fans may not realize that the team played 23 games that year: 6 preseason, 14 regular season and 3 postseason… in route to their first and only (new era) championship… thus far. They also played the Oakland Raiders in the preseason making four times they played that year… not the highly publicized three.

Of course that whole process started in the summer at training camp. From early July to late August the number one hit in America was “In the Year 2525” by Zager & Evans. The most popular movie was “Midnight Cowboy” (“Hey, I’m walking here!”) and television was ruled by Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-in and Gunsmoke, a family favorite.

In 1969 the cost of a loaf of bread was 23¢, a gallon of gas was 35¢ and the cost of a Super Bowl commercial was a mere $55,000 (the average cost for approximately two houses). Now, 30 seconds will run ya 4.5 million… a little bit more than a couple of houses.

So, here are the 13 Grooviest Moves of John Dorsey… and noooo… I haven’t been smoking anything (in fact I never even tired). But, why “13” you ask? My father was born on a Friday the 13th and it’s forever been a lucky number, and a lucky day, for me. Also, when I began to count the grooviest moves of Mr. Dorsey in the past three years… they far outnumbered any convenient number like… say… ten.

Four years ago I published the Top Ten Smooth Moves of Scott Pioli. If… for some incredibly unsound reason… you’d like to go back and take a look at that list, be my guest.

If you really want to get a “feel” for the way our world was in 1969 you may want to watch the videos which accompany each of the 13 grooviest moves. If you’re not as old a codger as I am — someone who lived through the 1960s — the videos are an opportunity to catch a snapshot-like glimpse of what our culture was like that last time our Kansas City Chiefs took the field… and the world… by storm.

In any event, be sure not to miss the last video collection (tomorrow in PART II) of highlights of current Kansas City Chiefs plus some 1969 Super Bowl moments with my special hand-picked 60’s hit over-layed.

Now, without further ado, the 13 grooviest moves of Juan Michael Dorsey.

Next: Find out how Only the Strong Survive