Tyler Palko, a former quarterback for the Kansas City Chiefs, has been arrested this weekend on suspicion of driving under the influence in Johnson County, Kansas. He was released soon thereafter on a $1,300 bond.
Palko, who is now 37, was brought into custody shortly after midnight and was released five hours later, per sources.
For Chiefs fans, Palko is one of the more interesting role players in recent team history, although that period for the franchise was certainly one of the most frustrating overall. After all, Palko’s short stint with the team is tied to the embarrassing secrecy and toxic work environment created under general manager Scott Pioli and the failure of head coach Todd Haley to win games with the roster given.
Tyler Palko makes bad decisions.
The only official snaps ever played by Palko in the National Football League came with the K.C. Chiefs in 2010 and 2011, a, stint that came after Palko had first entered the league with the Arizona Cardinals for three seasons and was then forced to find work with the Montreal Alouettes in the Canadian Football League as well as the California Redwoods in the now-defunct United Football League (2009-2012). Yes, the California Redwoods.
Reminiscing about these days will make most of Chiefs Kingdom pretty sober (or is that just sorrowful?), especially when reflecting on the fact that Palko was given the chance to start a quarter of the games during the Chiefs 2011 season. Palko went 1-3 in that span and threw only 2 touchdowns compared with 7 interceptions with a quarterback rating of 59.8.
What’s amazing is that the Chiefs finished 7-9 that season and were close to being competitive if not for this sort of silly decision-making on the part of Haley, which feels like an obvious middle finger in retrospect for Pioli in what became an ugly dispute that led to the head coach’s firing.
The good news is that Clark Hunt would soon clear house from top to bottom and bring in the combination of head coach Andy Reid and general manager John Dorsey, a team that would set the table for the organization’s current run of sustained success.
At the very least, this bit of news reminds us that Palko’s decision-making off the field mirrors his on-field prowess as well (and that the quarterback play in K.C. has improved just a bit over the years).