The best Kansas City Chiefs to ever wear the uniform: No. 42

In this special offseason series, we analyze the best players in Kansas City Chiefs history to wear every single uniform number. Here’s No. 42.

There’s a comparative dilemma when it comes to the varied football leagues that have developed over the years. The National Football League is the metric we use to determine a particular player’s greatness, but therein brings up an issue in wondering how to handle alternate leagues and the greater performances within them.

This has troubled analysts and historians over time as we all struggle to accurately compare stats from, say, the AFL to the NFL in the earliest years, or the USFL or even CFL to the NFL. This could happen again soon as the AAF takes off next February.

As we all know, a great player in one doesn’t necessarily translate into another because of inferior competition, rule changes, etc., but it’s also true that a great football player can be a great football player in any league. Ask Doug Flutie, Warren Moon, Jim Kelly and today’s featured player—who just happens to be the greatest member of the Kansas City Chiefs to wear No. 42.

The Others

While no one comes even close to measuring up to the leader, there are some nice names here to still wear the uniform, including its current wearer: Anthony Sherman. Remember Sherman came over from the Arizona Cardinals as the return in a trade for Javier Arenas that no one paid much attention to. Even as the fullback position goes the way of the dinosaur, the Chiefs are still holding on to this trade asset as a key special teams player and fullback. In short, it’s hard not to love Sherman.

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Defensive back Charles Mincy played a few nice seasons in Kansas City in the early ’90s. Safety Shaunard Harts did the same one decade after Mincy. Sabby Piscitelli might be the worst player to ever wear the uniform. Others include M.L. Carter, Cyrus Gray, Jeff Smith and Jeff Donaldson.

The Runner-up: MacArthur Lane

It would be nice to give this to Sherman, but the Chiefs had another nice fullback for three seasons back in the late ’70s who put up some seriously good numbers.

Lane played for the Cardinals and Packers before the Chiefs traded a draft pick for the veteran back before the 1976 season. A former linebacker turned fullback, Lane came into the Chiefs offensive game plan and became a go-to receiver rather than just a “truck” of a player (his former college nickname). In fact, Lane actually led the NFL in receptions with 66 that season for 686 yards. He also rushed for 542 yards that season, giving him a career-high 1,228 yards from scrimmage that year.

Lane would play his final four seasons with the Chiefs, the last third of a nice, productive career in the NFL.

The Winner: Johnny Robinson

Anyone who has an issue with Johnny Robinson making the leap from being a Chiefs Hall of Fame member to an actual member of the bigger Hall in Canton will likely point to the AFL and make the associations listed above. But here’s the thing. Robinson was a star safety in both. He led the league (AFL and then NFL) twice in interceptions with 10 in both seasons, once before and once after the giant merger.

For those who don’t know, let me back up and tell you that Robinson was the first star safety for the Kansas City Chiefs, a player with an monumental amount of interceptions in his career (57) which still stands at No. 2 overall behind Emmitt Thomas on the franchise’s all-time list. He also added another four interceptions in the postseason, showing that he rose to the occasion of his competition, a sign of the best football players no matter the league they play.

In addition to Robinson’s duties at safety, he also served as a returner on special teams for a spell as well as running back, rushing for 658 yards and catching another 76 passes for 1,212 receiving yards through his first two seasons in the AFL. He had a total of 15 offensive touchdowns before converting to safety. From there he made 7 Pro Bowls and was eventually named to the team’s Hall of Fame.

Next: The Best to Wear It: No. 41

Congratulations to Johnny Robinson for being the greatest Chiefs player to ever wear the No. 42 on his uniform!

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