Ten Things About Today's Game

[gblowfish]

Ten Things About Today's Game:

10. What a great week its been for the locals! First the Royals sweep their way to the World Series and turn the entire town -and the Chiefs Planet- Royal Blue. Yesterday Kansas State upsets the Sooners in Norman. Mizzou bounces back and turns the Florida Gators into a nice set of Alligator Luggage. And KU, well.... they're another week closer to the opening of basketball season. Nobody talked much about this game in San Diego because it was a foregone conclusion that Phyllis would carve up our woeful patchwork secondary. And for a good part of his time on the field, he did exactly that. Thing is, he was only on the field for 21 minutes of this game, so his opportunities were limited by Andy Reid's smothering ball control offense. The Chiefs did enough right to overcome the whole lot of wrong, and we'll talk about both. As we always say, you never apologize for a win. And we also say, the Chiefs always seem to blow one (Tennessee) and win one (New England or today, pick em) that you didn't expect. But the end result is, with one of the hardest opening six game schedules in the NFL, the Fighting Kool Aid Man's team is 3-3, which is about where they should be to have half a chance to succeed this year.

9. Charles was just a nickel short of 100 on the ground, and of course gets a big congratulations for breaking Priest Holmes all-time Chiefs rushing record - 6,113 yards. Andy seemed to get the message after Charles disappeared last week in the second half of the 49ers game. Hey, 25 is pretty good, might be a good idea to use him! Davis ran hard and got blasted on several plays, as did Charles. Nobody fumbled. That's the first key to this game.

8. Alex Smith is not The Giant Forehead, and he's not Phyllis. But he had enough moxie to keep the team in the game to win. Eight different guys had catches, with the only TD reception by The Sausage. Yes, Alex slipped them the sausage, and the sausage greased his way between three guys to plate that TD. Sherman should have Farmland sponsor a line of bratwurst for him. He'd make big bucks. Smith only threw seven passes in the first half, and ended up with 221 yards and one passing TD, and no picks. That's the second key to the game. He also rushed six times -or ran for his life six times, whatever you want to call it- for 29 yards. He was good enough to win today, so you have to tip your hat. Nice job.

7. Special teams were a bit better today, but we're still making stupid mistakes. If the ball is five yards or less deep on kickoffs, we're trending to bring it out every single time. We seem to get a holding penalty about 50% of the time. I think we need to pick our spots better. Sure, Davis or DAT are both capable of breaking a long one, but if you try to force it every time, we end up starting about half of our drives from around the ten yard line. Colquitt had a mediocre day, averaging just 38 yards on four punts. DAT had one nice punt return early for 27 yards. The Brazilian Midget came through in the end, although it looked like that ball was rolling down an uneven putting green. It started straight, went a bit right, then hooked back left just enough to sneak it inside the right upright. Glad the kid converted. Succop's missed kick in SD last year put the Chargers in the playoffs and knocked out the Steelers. So it was nice to get some payback a year later. Suck on it, Bolts fans.

6. Eric Berry has now missed 37% of the entire season. Today our secondary was made up of Smith, Abdullah, Parker, Coleman, Gaines and some ****ing guy named Fleming. Now, I said a long time ago, that the Chiefs should never, EVER, EVER allow another defensive back from Oklahoma to put on a Chiefs Jersey. The horrid years watching William "Crispy" Bartee taught me that. Or at the very least, any D-Back from Oklahoma must have rear view mirrors attached to each side of his helmet. Phyllis went after this guy immediately, and baked him repeatedly in the first half with completions or PI penalties. Weird thing is, the dude led the team in tackles today with six. And he played much better in the fourth quarter. On the first Bolts TD to Phillips, there wasn't even a red jersey in the TV frame with the guy. Just too easy. The second TD to Gates was just a good catch by Gates. Parker almost tipped the ball away but didn't get enough of it. Defense held Phyllis to two FGs in the fourth quarter, which is the third key to this game.

5. We won today despite our receiving corps' best efforts. AJ Jenkins catches a ball and with nobody between him and pay dirt, runs himself out of bound. Bowe had a couple more balls bounce off his hands. He still has zero TDs six games into the season. For what he's being paid, that's unacceptable. Hemmingway has nothing but open field in front of him on a quick slant, nobody picks him up, perfectly thrown ball, bounces off his hands like a twenty below zero day in Ann Arbor. All I could think of after that play was...."Hmmm....maybe Junior has the same genetic predisposition as Ernest, and will go home a wrap his lips around a shotgun." OK, too much. I apologize. But you can't drop a pass like that and expect to stay in the lineup. Kelce had another decent day, but needs to learn clock management. In the final drive, he could have popped out of bounds to save some time, but turned inside and cost the Chiefs their last time out. Turned out OK, but might have been a killer had Smith taken a sack at the end. Overall, this receiving corps is woeful compared to the Bolts or the Donks. GM Dorsey must get some talent in here next year if we're gong to compete in our division.

4. Speaking of clock and time out management, The big red Kool Aid Man continues to baffle me. In the second half they burn the first time out with 10 seconds left in the third quarter. Why? There was no strategic value to it, and they had plenty of time to get a play in and run it. The wind was not that big of a factor, going the opposite direction didn't mean a thing. Then with about five minutes left, he challenges a spot on a pass play to the Bolts 35 yard line. The play was too close to overturn a spot, as it wasn't clear and convincing evidence. Plus, even it they did overturn it, the Bolts would have fourth and 1/2 yard on the 36, and the way Oliver was running the ball, would probably pick that up anyway. So why risk burning the time out? Didn't understand that one at all. Luckily, the one time out we did preserve was all we needed in the final two minute drill.

3. Kudos to the Brazilian Midget today. He was three for three on field goals, and got his first taste of nailing a pressure kick to win a game. Hopefully that'll push his nuts back down out of his throat for the rest of the year. He seems to be doing a better job with his kickoffs too. Let's hope he settles down and becomes reasonably reliable. I worry about how he'll do in cold weather in December.

2. Hali and Houston each with a sack, Hali stripped Phyllis once and almost forced a fumble deep in SD territory. I'm still not satisfied with Poe's play. He only had one tackle, and the Bolts ran for good yardage over Poe throughout the day. I'm also concerned with his stamina, as he was gassed at the end, and they were playing other linemen in his spot during crunch time. He's an All-Pro nose tackle. He needs to step up his game, get some staying power, and see it through to the end. Glad Brandon Flowers didn't hurt us today. He's been all banged up and probably shouldn't have suited up. Sucks to be him.

1. Being five hundred at this point is a game better than what I figured we'd be in pre season after six games. After the Tennessee disaster, I could even see us being a Raider like 0-6 by now. Reid is a good enough coach to keep the team in the hunt. And who knows? If the Donks get beat tonight we'll just be a game out in the division. Chiefs dominated time of possession in this game three to one, didn't turn the ball over, and had decent balance on offense. They also converted 50% on third down and hit all three field goal attempts. That's all the good stuff. Receivers are dropping balls or making dumb plays, we're trending up in penalties -before this game we were second in fewest penalties in the NFL- and Alex is running for his life -he was sacked three times today. Still, we don't apologize for a win, especially over that whiney little Bitch Phyllis.

BTW: next week I'll need to have one of you faithful CP'ers do the Ten Things as a guest writer, as I'll be on the road all day next Sunday and won't be at the Chiefs game. If you'd like to write Ten Things next week, pitch your best pitch and I'll turn over the ink and quill for Chiefs-Rams at Arrowhead to the most persuasive ghost writer.

Oh, and one last very important bonus thing..... GO ROYALS.

KC Star game pictures are here:
http://www.kansascity.com/sports/nfl...le3076215.html