SB Nation User Blog: SillyHatDay

The Fight for 500

SillyHatDay — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 16:52:19 -0000

Simple question: Do you think the Chiefs make it to 500 this season? In my estimation- Chargers - W - Talented team that can't put it together. If we come out amped from last week and catch SD off guard from jump, we walk out with a win. Jaguars - L - Inconsistent team but they have thus far beaten the teams they were supposed to. The Chiefs are one of those teams. Hope for an off game on their part Raiders - W - Chiefs obliterate them. The fluke loss is avenged Steelers - L - Too complete of a team. This looks like the Giants game Chargers - L - The difference is slim and home field puts it in favor of SD. Broncos - W - A much better team on paper than they really are. They fall to a Chiefs team hungry to show them up Bills - W - Lost to the browns in a game similar to KC vs WAS. KC wins this one in another clunker of a game. Browns - W - Chiefs win comfortably coasting on momentum from previous weeks. Bengals - L - Just a better football team Broncos - L - Denver is no easy place to play, and we're not good enough to account for it. That puts us at 6-10 on the year by my count, so we fall short of 500. I think we could beat the Jags and the Bengals so if we break even that's the route.

The Best and the Worst

SillyHatDay — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 00:26:18 -0000

Which chiefs (relative to the team itself) are playing the best, and which are playing the worst?

My Picks:

Best:

Cassel - a very good leader if nothing else. He's taking a beating and still making plays when given the chance

Colquitt - bad ones here and there but generally he wins the field position fight for us. top punter in net yds

Hali- closest thing to a pass rush we can muster

O'callaghan - not shattering opponents but a pleasant suprise at RT

Worst:

Niswanger - god awful. just gets blown up constantly.

Goff- see above.

Secondary - getting torched on big plays

Matt Cassel Sucks?

SillyHatDay — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 22:10:35 -0000

For those of you who are already calling for Cassel's head: ease the noise. Matt Cassel is playing behind the 28th ranked pass blocking Offensive line, which is going to be a major adjustment for him to make given where he came from, and his playing style. There are two criticisms of Matt that I think are so far fair. 1) he reacts to pressure when it isn't there 2) his pocket awareness is off.

1) hes getting knocked around more than he had been used to, but mroe so, his time to make a play has been slashed. He is going to take a while to calm down from his current state of constant alarm.

2) Once he does the above, he wil settle and be more able to hang in the pocket when he does have time.

A criticism I do not feel is just is that he is a bad decision maker. Trent Dilfer dinged him on having difficulty making it through his progressions. I see why he is saying this, but I don't think that is what it is. Tom Brady and Peyton Manning progress throught options at light speed. Cassel is much more recursory and methodical. If his decisions were bad, he wouldnt have one of the best completion % in the league(08) and best TD-INT ratio. He is just very analytical about progression reads. Ben Roethlisberger is the same way. Even with a good line, Ben takes a lot of sacks. Cassel is the same way and thus got sacked a lot even with NE's line. It's just how he plays, and the offense should be adjusted to fit this. While like Ben, Matt Cassel takes longer to finish reads, and is very mobile, but he lacks the sort of arm strength ben has. Cassel is not a guy who is going to consistantly beat you deep. He is more of a mid range passer who hits guys in front of the defender. Since he has a poor line, Haley shold be drawing up plays that use a lot of hot routes, slants, crosses, and comebacks. Hot routes cut down the need for long reads and let him get the ball out of there fast. assuming it is executed well, he will be making a lot of 6-12 yd completions that keep us away from 3rd and long and the offense will speed up. Cassel can make those throws all day as he has shown. Even when guys are covered he can slip the ball right into the spot it needs to be. Cassel is very accurate passer with the ability to beat you underneath every time. So far both of his INTs were more so fantastic plays by the defender than out of place passes.

Cassel is:

Lethally accurate

Very smart

A good, detailed reader

mobile enough to get away or save/extend plays

He just needs to calm down and play to his strengths. Haley has also got to trust him enough to let him beat his opponent instead of calling draw plays on 3rd and 15. The thing that I fell makes calling for Cassle's head the silliest is that he has been thus hardly had anything asked of him other than make it to the end alive.

Let him loose Todd.

Why LT might be a bigger need that RT

SillyHatDay — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 22:24:32 -0000

A point I always harp on is playing guys out of position. if you play any chess you know you can't switch a pawn and rook; it just won't work. Positions in football are, for the most part, the same way. When people complain that Branden Albert is not playing up to expectations, I always defend him as a victim of poor placement. Albert was a great LG in college. We go draft him and wonder why hes not a phenom at LT. Well it just isn't his position. Given this, I'm thinking that when Brain Waters is gone, the natural replacement is Albert. I'm starting to favor putting Waters on the market as soon as now so we can offload his contract and make room for a young Albert at his natural position. Waters does not seem happy here and is entering the twilight of his career. He certainly still has some market value so he is a perfect trade candidate. For now RT appears filled at least adequately with O'callaghan and Ndukwe so unless we pull a player for player trade (Waters for good LT), which has become rather uncommon, then we are left with a hole at LT.

Next offseason might see the chiefs looking for a LT and C to round out a good line.

Ego...Ego...Ego

SillyHatDay — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 21:38:43 -0000

I watched Jack Harry after the game vs the Giants and he discussed LJ's "ego" comment. Harry was confused as the what LJ meant and apparently a lot of people are. Here is my analysis of what LJ means:

–noun, plural e⋅gos.

1.	the “I” or self of any person; a person as thinking, feeling, and willing, and distinguishing itself from the selves of others and from objects of its thought.

2.	Psychoanalysis. the part of the psychic apparatus that experiences and reacts to the outside world and thus mediates between the primitive drives of the id and the demands of the social and physical environment.

3.	egotism; conceit; self-importance: Her ego becomes more unbearable each day.

4.	self-esteem or self-image; feelings: Your criticism wounded his ego.

When asked what separated the Giants and Chiefs, LJ replied "ego - ego - ego." As soon as he said it, I immediately understood (or so i think) what he meant. Johnson is saying that the Giants know who they are and what they can do. They have the confidence to come out swinging and bust you in the mouth. The Chiefs, on the other hand, lack all of this. KC has to team identity, there is zero confidence, and we lack PRIDE. The KC Chiefs are a prideless team right now. I don't know if Todd Haley is upset about this, but he has to know deep down that LJ is right. When we finally win a game, Haley has to be able to turn that into confidence. If he can't, we will do what we did last year and just have a couple fluke wins that don't translate into improvement.

LJ is not only right, he could not have said it better.

Question on draft picks

SillyHatDay — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 00:57:12 -0000

This isn't a Chiefs related issue, aside from this being able to happen to anyone. The question is: if Michael Crabtree does hold out for the entire season, what happens to the 49ers? Does he owe them anything for shafting them out of their #1 pick? Will SF get a compensatory pick next year? is their any (other) way the team will be compensated for this? Just something i've wondered for a while. It seems wrong to let a team's draft picks just dissolve into thin air.

Haley's play calling

SillyHatDay — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 22:44:33 -0000

I was excited when we got Todd Haley. I thought he brought something that this team needed: a swift kick in the ass and a frank admission that we needed big time change. When he took over play calling duties I thought we would have an agressive offense that would try to punch the other team in the mouth, even if it missed. So far, however, Haley's play calling has been junk. Today he was callind dinky draw plays on 3rd and 20. Every third and long we had he ran some silly run play that had no hope to get us the yards we needed. The only time he didn't run on 3rd was 3rd and 1, an obvious run down. 3rd and 1 is 90% of the reason you pay LJ, or any NFL RB, a hefty salary. As the game drew on the running game was showing itself to be a failure, yet Haley stubbornly resulted to it all the more. The more it flopped, the more he ran it seemed. The two drives where we showed any willingness to go down field on them, we scored two touchdowns. Haley called and UBER CONSERVATIVE game which gave us no hope to win. Say what you will of the calibur of talent we have but it seemed like we didn't even try. I never felt like Haley was actively trying to beat the Eagles. Maybe the Chiefs were outclassed from jump, and we probably were. It is reasonable for this Chiefs team to fall to that Eagles team. I won't put the loss squarely oh Haley's shoulders, but I do blame his horrific play calling for the blowout.

I know you don't have Warner, Boldin, and Fitz. I also know you can't win without attacking your opponent.

Go big or go home.

Why we're not so good

SillyHatDay — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 19:22:45 -0000

I'm going to offer a reason for why the Chiefs are not as good as they should be, in spite of the talent we have.

Our two biggest problem areas are the lines on each side of the ball. consider this fact, a large number of our guys are playing out of position.

Glen Dorsey drafted as a RG. We had a Pro Bowl RG so we stuck him at RT

Rudy Niswanger is a G playing C

Andy Alleman is a C/RG playing LG

Wade Smith plays every position along the line

Ike Ndukwe is a LG playing LT

you can say C to G is nothing but C is responsible for line calls so he needs to be able to read a defense like a QB

Thats 5 of 8 OL guys spending at least some time out position. that is 3 or 5 starters

now on the Defensive side

Glen Dorsey was drafted as a DT and we have him at DE

Alex Magee was drafted as a DT and is playing DE

Tamba Hali is a DE playing OLB who is awkwardly sized for both. he is probably best as a 4-3 DE

Andy Studebaker is a DE playing OLB

Peirre Walters in a DE playing OLB

Demorrio Williams is an OLB playing ILB

If we just played guys at their natureal positions, we would probably get more out of them. This is my suspicion why there is underperformance along the lines, especially from Dorsey and ALbert.

Chargers donate big time to GOP

SillyHatDay — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 02:18:14 -0000

Chargers donate big time to GOP

Even more reason to not like the chargers

Ike Ndukwe

SillyHatDay — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 21:15:53 -0000

Chiefs fans have been worried about the RT position for a year now. We finally dumped Mcintosh and played Ndukwe in game one. I tried to pay attention to him as much as i could and i saw a solid RT. I never saw him get flat beat but he wasn't man handling his opponents either. A couple of times I saw him get pushed into the backfield but he still staying on his man. Ndukwe didn't blow me away but he looked solid, which is light years better than what we had. I'm very curious about what the rest of you saw (with all your fancy NFLN and TIVO) from him.

I'm thinking he did well enough, at least in that game, to direct our panic toward C

thoughts and observations?