Ten Things About Last Night's Failure

[gblowfish]

Ten Things About Last Night's Game

10. I didn't -or should say couldn't - write this last night immediately after the game for several reasons. A) I was really pissed off, and I don't write worth a damn when I'm pissed off; B) I wanted to collect my thoughts so as not to over-react and not just roast everybody; and C) It was a damn Thursday night, and yes, I have an actual day job and pretend to work for a living (they pretend to pay me.) So today I come to you from my office here in bucolic Johnson County to write a brief Ten Things. Brief, because at this point, we've already hashed out most of the minutia about this sewage fest, and brief, because believe it or not, I do have actual work that has to be accomplished today.

9. For you younger guys who don't really understand the Raider hate and only have Donk hatred, remember this game and let it give you indigestion for awhile. Games like last night is why you should never, ever EVER overlook the Raiders. These sorry sacks of shit had lost sixteen straight games before last night. Let that sink in for a minute. Sixteen-Straight-Games…including a big goose egg for ten this year. And yet, they flat out beat us last night. This game was no fluke. The better team in this particular contest won. They wanted it more. They hustled more, and (I can't believe I'm going to say this) they played a smarter game than KC did. KC comes off an extremely physical game vs. the Super Bowl Champs, gets two days preparation, travels halfway across the country, to play a nationally televised night game -where road teams before last night were 3-7, in absolute shit weather, on one of the worst playing surfaces in football, with a chance to take a half game lead in the division on their next opponent, the other team who played in last years Super Bowl. And like the headline on the KC Star's Sports section said this morning, we got "Chokeland." This will probably be the only win this year for the Raiders, unless they beat us in Arrowhead again this year. Don't laugh, Oakland is 7-3 Vs. KC in the last five years. There's plenty of blame to go around. This was truly a team effort. Let's start with some well deserved flaming:

8. The first half was certainly the worst half of football the Chiefs have played since last year's playoff collapse in the second half vs. Andrew Luck. Let's start with the defense. KC gave up 112 yards and TWO rushing TDs in ONE HALF to Oakland's THIRD STRING tailback. This is a team that had previously given up ZERO rushing TDs in their first ten games. The 90 yard TD was inexcusable. Dontari Poe took himself completely out of the play. Apparently now he thinks he's Justin Houston and must spin and swim on a QB sack pass rush on every play. He lost gap contain and opened the hole for the running back. Then Mauga misses the tackle, proving once again why DJ is an All-Pro inside linebacker. Then Murray takes off like he's Tony Dorsett, and sprints 90 yards uncontested for a TD. Oh sure, Eric Berry tried chasing him, but looked like he was running through quick sand. Luckily Coleman was able to knock the day living shit out of Murray in the next series, or the dude probably would have run for 200 yards against us. Justin Houston? Where were you? One sack, four tackles? Not good enough. Tamba Hali? Two tackles, no sacks? Not good enough. Poe? Two tackles. Berry? Four tackles. Not…good…enough. Turnovers forced? ZERO on defense. I mention these guys cause they are all All-Pro players. These are the team leaders on defense, and they didn't get the job done, ESPECIALLY in the fourth quarter after KC got the lead. If you are indeed a championship caliber team, you have to shut down the opposition and take control in that situation. Instead the Chiefs gave up a six minute drive culminating in a go ahead TD (not-Field Goal, TD) leaving the Chiefs less than two minutes down by four. Meanwhile, Oakland's linebackers are stuffing the run, shutting down Charles and making Smith run for his life all night long. Again, Raiders deserved to win, Chiefs defense wilts when most needed. Fail.

7. During that final drive, Abdullah is covering a wide out. Rookie QB Carr over shoots his receiver, ball hits Abdullah square in the hands - I mean SQUARE in the hands- and doinks off him for a harmless incompletion. Adbullah is the free safety. He has to make that play. Catch that ball, win the game. FAIL. JMJ drops back in pass coverage, QB Carr under throws his receiver. JMJ mis-times his jump, only gets one hand of the football, knocks it straight up in the air, can't recover to catch the football, another harmless incompletion. Catch that ball, win the game. FAIL. Big time defenses take charge when the game is in the balance. Fail, Fail, Fail.

6. The Raiders as a collective organization are stupid, but not so stupid to not watch game film from last year. Apparently, Andy Reid thought that a year later, the Raiders would still not be prepared for screen passes. The Raiders defense in the first half was very simple. Run blitz, run blitz, run blitz, spy Charles, and do not allow a screen. Luckily, Reid made some adjustments at half time, enough to get the lead back, but Andy is so damn hard headed that he makes me want to put my head through a wall. The final drive to take the lead: Chiefs have third and three from inside the ten. They don't even need a TD, they just need a first down. Get to the two or three yard line and it's first and goal. On third down, instead of getting Knile Davis in there and pounding for a first down, they roll Smith out to the right, and he throws the ball away. So you kick a Field Goal to go up by three, instead of getting a go ahead TD, and you end up losing by four. Nobody fears our receivers. The Raiders had given up 80 yards to Charles. Davis -who is our power back- only got two freaking carries all night. Maybe they were afraid to hand him a wet football? Who knows? In the fourth quarter, the rain had stopped, so I don't get it. You could have gone on third and fourth down. If Davis can't get you three yards in two carries, you deserve to lose.

5. Eric Fisher, you played like crap. We matched the Raiders in penalties -both teams flagged seven times for sixty yards. When you match the Raiders in penalties -INCLUDING two holding calls by Fisher- you're playing like crap. DAT, what is your problem? First of all, you never field a punt inside the ten yard line. And if you DO field a punt inside the ten yard line, the last thing you do is run BACKWARD to the three yard line. Apparently, Dave Toub had seen enough too, because Hammond was fielding punts the remainder of the game after that little fiasco. Colquitt gets dinged up, thank GOD the Brazilian Midget didn't have to be pressed into punt service. Zombo got the only Raider turnover of the night on a muffed punt in the rain in the second quarter. But of course, the Chiefs proceeded to march straight backwards. The only scoring the team could muster in the first half was a measly field goal. But, when you go 1 for 8 on third down, you're going to have a crappy half. Chiefs ended the game 2-14 in third down conversions, and zip for one on fourth down. That leads to KC punting seven times in one game. SEVEN punts. That's sad. Colquitt only punted twice last week vs. Seattle, and both of those punts came in the fourth quarter.

4. Andy Reid fell on the sword in his post game presser saying the team was not prepared for this game properly. DUH….ya think??? I also thought the play calling was way too conservative in the first half, and adjustments needed to be made after the first quarter, not at half time. Teams know the Chiefs have NO vertical passing game. It's all sweeps to Charles, or screens to Charles, or sweeps to DAT. Nobody is afraid of Bowe. Nobody is afraid of Hemmingway. Bowe did next to nothing in this game. He had one catch for 24 yards, and again no TDs. If we ever could have used a TD from wide out, this was the week. The rain in the first half would have made downfield passing difficult, but with Oakland's penchant for penalties, chances are in the second half we might have gotten a PI on them. You know, kind of like what they did to Parker in the fourth quarter to sustain their drive.

3. The one guy who didn't seem to have a problem getting open was Kelce. He led the team with four catches and 67 yards. If he's the only guy who can get open, and if you insist on throwing the ball, you should target him six, seven, eight times a game. Reid always seems to go away from whatever is working. It's like he has all these tools at his disposal, and he feels obligated to play with all of them, and not just stay with the ones that have proven to be successful. And in the first half, if you're gonna run Charles, then run him. Give him the ball time after time after time. And even if you go three and out, you're wearing down the Oakland defense. Then bring Davis in and pound them. It was amazing to me that even after playing like total dog shit the first half, KC was able to come back and get the lead in the second half. I was sorely disappointed that the defense could not hold the lead. That was, frankly, surprising, against one of the NFL's worst offenses.

2. Oakland's coach Tony Soprano is a guido and a douche. Who wears sunglasses at night during a rainstorm???

1. The thing that makes me the most angry about this choke job is, that's its basically made the Seattle and New England win less meaningful. As much as I loathe saying this, the Five Head has OWNED the Chiefs over his career. And until the Chiefs beat his ass, in Arrowhead, we will continue to be underdogs in our home stadium. Additionally, instead of being a half game up, we're now a half game down of the division lead. Plus our chance to get a first round bye has diminished greatly. Is the season over? No. Are we still in the playoff hunt? Probably, but if we lose next week at home to the Donks we're now 7-5 and headed to Arizona for a road game against one of the best teams in the NFL. I think at best we'll be a wild card team and have to go on the road…. again…. just like last year. So, it is what it is. At least we'll get a few extra days to prepare for the Donks. After this skid mark in the shorts, we'll need all the preparation time we can get.

[KChiefs1]

It's taken me this long to read this George. Couldn't/Wouldn't read anything about that abortion on Thursday until today.

Good read.

[R8RFAN]

Originally Posted by GloryDayz

Meh, Raiders and happiness......usually means a new set of batteries.

I knew the Raiders weren't going 0-16 but I thought we would actually beat the Chargers last week.

Andy usually gets em up to play after a loss, After you beat Denver next week all will be forgotten.

To be honest, I was so use to losing on the last drive via an INT or the opposing team marching down the field on us I really didn't get excited that much, I had more fun trolling some of the hardcore guys here to be honest.

I am getting older, the shit just don't mean as much to me as it used to.

[GloryDayz]

Originally Posted by R8RFAN

I knew the Raiders weren't going 0-16 but I thought we would actually beat the Chargers last week.

Andy usually gets em up to play after a loss, After you beat Denver next week all will be forgotten.

To be honest, I was so use to losing on the last drive via an INT or the opposing team marching down the field on us I really didn't get excited that much, I had more fun trolling some of the hardcore guys here to be honest.

I am getting older, the shit just don't mean as much to me as it used to.

We'll see about that! Don't forget, Andy is fat and the game has all but passed him up.

[rockachalk]

a couple things about this game:

Mauga sucks in run support. I know he's no DJ. But that 90 yard run was because he failed to hit his hole that the RB was coming out of. This defense is predicated around every man doing their job. If even one guy fails to do that, its going to result in a big play for the opposing offense.

The thing about Mauga is that this wasn't the only game where this has happened. Granted this was the only one where the RB hit a 90 yard run. He's been poor in run support all year long. Last week against Seattle, lynch should have been stopped in the backfield several times, but Mauga missed the play. We really miss DJ. I hope he comes back next year. I have no idea what his contract is, or when its up. But we gotta have a healthy DJ on this defense.

Abdullah could have sealed the victory for the chiefs had he intercepted the ball that hit him RIGHT IN HIS HANDS. This was on the raiders last monstrous 7+ minute drive where they scored. If he catches that, the chiefs can sit on the ball with good field position. We do seem to have a secondary that can cover now. But good lord would it be nice if they could snag a few INT's every once in a while. They cant catch a football to save their lives.

[rockachalk]

As always gblowfish, great take on the game. I enjoy reading your analysis. Its always spot on!

I agree about the screens. Last year we ate them up on the screens. The raiders were sniffing those out with impunity Thursday night. Outside of one to DAT where he had a great run after contact (that could have just as easily been picked off by the raider defender), the screen game wasn't working.

Part of that first half I feel was a result of the weather. The rain really affected our game plan. I thought after the half (when the rain stopped) we moved the ball with ease against the Raiders. Alex had like 10 pass completions in a row, and there wasn't much the raiders could do to stop us. So at least we made second half adjustments; though I'm not sure how much of it had to do with the rain.