Here are Bartel’s numbers from 2003, when he was SMU’s leading passer (via ESPN).

151 attempts, 68 completions (for a 45% completion percentage), 4 TDs and 9 INTs. Oh yeah, I can definitely see how Carl Peterson thinks he’s a find.

He wasn’t a very good QB at Tarleton State. If you’re looking for NFL QB prospects out of Division II, they’d better do a hell of a lot better than a 50% completion percentage and 2 TDs their senior year.

Ick.

(That’s not meant to cast aspersions on Tarleton State in relation to other Division II schools, by the way).

I used to manage a guy that was RB at Tarleton when Derrick Ross was there. It was a hoot when he found out I was a Chiefs fan. The first thing he told me was that Derrick was terrible at holding on to the ball – which we found to be true. But he also pointed out that he was a tough runner, and if he ever got his fumbling under control he would be stout.

Anyhoo, this fella was (and maybe still is) trying to break in to the NFL and got invited to a workout at the RCA dome in ‘07 for a handful of teams. He didn’t get snagged, and I don’t know if he’s still trying or not. I still have his highlight DVD and I still google his name from time to time to see if he’s doing anything.

Too bad they have to declare for the draft first before they’re eligible to be signed by an NFL team. :)

The Chiefs have spent good money on free agents in the past, problem is that they spend it on players who they shouldn’t. Big contract for a Donnie Edwards, who’s getting close to the end of his career. Big contract for Napolean Harris who was never that good and who’s no longer a starter at linebacker for us (but we can’t cut him yet because of the cap hit). Big contract for Kendrell Bell, who was coming off a serious knee injury and played in a different style of defense from what we ran. Big contract for Ty Law, who was already showing signs of serious decline. Big contract for Patrick Surtain that carried him well into his decline years before it became feasible to cut him. Same story with our guys whose contracts get extended…big contract for Larry Johnson (28 and coming off a season in which he was ridiculously abused), big contract for Priest Holmes right before he hit the age when almost all running backs fall off the cliff. It’s not that the Chiefs are unwilling to spend money in free agency, it’s that when they do so they often spend that money on players who aren’t very good bets to be productive for the life of those contracts…and then we end up carrying those terrible contracts because it’s too expensive to cut them. And I think a lot of that goes back to Carl Peterson’s apparent predilection for paying players based more on past performance than on a reasonable projection of future performance, which is the wrong way to run a football team.

He’s old, he plays a rather selfish and undisciplined style of football (has ever since Holmgren left Green Bay, which is why he hasn’t been to another Super Bowl since), he’s apparently not much of a mentor and I don’t think he wanted to be part of a rebuilding project anyway. I’m glad that we’d didn’t bring him here.

I think you’re assuming that loyalty matters more than performance…it doesn’t, and both players and management understand that this is the nature of the business. Players’ value lies in what a player can achieve, not what he has achieved. There is no value in paying a running back a superstar contract because he got 1,700 yards the season before if there’s not a good chance that he’ll be performing at that same level for the life of the contract (meaning either for the length of the contract, or to the point at which it’s financially feasible to trade or cut him). There’s no value in paying a 34 year old linebacker a large contract because he’s averaged 100-150 tackles a year if that linebacker’s not going to get 100-150 tackles when he’s under contract to you. And players who focus on winning aren’t generally going to consider that kind of loyalty more of a draw than playing for a team that will get them a ring, or get them a bigger contract…and playing for a team with a lot of bad contracts will get them neither. In fact, that kind of management will probably do more to dissuade good players from coming to your team than it will to persuade them that you’re a good option…what you’ll usually end up doing is paying top dollar for mediocrity (which is what the Chiefs have often done). Paying based on past performance is one of the worst mistakes a team can make, because there’s no upside to it if you want your team to be successful in the future.