2010 NFL Draft: The Polls Don't Lie!

People need to settle down and quit overreacting just cuz Pioli didnt select the guys that YOU wanted. Guess what Pioli & Co know a hell of a lot more than any of us do and I will trust a 3 time sb winner & 3 time NFL executive of the year over anyone else.
I for one am happy with the draft and the offseason so far and can not wait for opening night MNF, which I will be fortunate enough to be going to

I see you found your rose colored glasses. We did draft a bunch of speed. If that’s Haley’s vision, so be it. The pundits will say that Pioli had a “so-so” draft, or just add a big “?” when they talk about the Chiefs. That’s still a good thing, just like the draft.

In the end, if you trust Pioli, you just smile and put on your red glasses. We’ll see soon enough whether Haley and Pioli are geniuses.

I suggested we trust Pioli and Haley before the draft began. Be patient. We will see a much better team this season.

Truer words have not been spoken. The team Pioli inherited was terrible. Terrible. Terrible. You can’t totally reload a virtually talentless team in an offseason or two. Our old friend Carl Peterson said it took five years to get to the Superbowl. I think he’s generally right, 3-5 years is what it takes (it took Sean Payton four years).

Also, why would anybody trust Mel Kiper’s judgement over Pioli’s? How many rings does Kiper have?

We’ve picked up playmakers on each side of the ball, including special teams.

Picking up the NT bought us some wiggle room to not only go after guys the high character guys and leaders they preach about, but also big time playmakers that are electric with the ball in their hands. And speedy! We really hadn’t had that for a few years until JC emerged

And isn’t that one of the biggest knocks against us, in addition to our core defense — that we needed playmakers and fielded one of, if not, THE slowest team in the league?

I’d say these picks address a lot of those concerns. Rome wasn’t built overnight, nor can a shattered football team be completely built in two drafts.

I would have written this same thing, but you beat me to it and Im happy you did!!!

This team is on top of the hill now looking at its destiny which has not been any brighter since Marty arrived 20 years ago.

You said it all. I love your unique insight and, uh, you are the man. Wrecked!

I totally agree with you. People need to stop freaking out, we just got better by drafting 4 playmaking Captains of teams!

These two are good football guys plain and simple. What I really like about this draft is it has given us a real idea of “the process”.

Any one think Donald Washington is gonna get converted to a Safety with the addition of Arenas? THey seem to like Mo Leggett (why I dont know) but CB depth has been added but Safety depth is lacking with McGraw and Page the other 2.

I too am now sold on Pioli’s genius. Love it. Rec’d.

I can’t wait for the Chargers to come and meet us at Arrowhead, and be had and beaten by the glorious Kansas City Chiefs!

Berry Jersey or Charles Jersey?

you said …

We were worse under Herm than we have been since…well….ever,/blockquote>

WRONG, Batman! you must not have been around in the late 70’s … omg, Herm was a coaching genius compared to Paul Wiggins … Herm’s team on a BAD day was 10x better than the teams we had back then … trust me, I was there, I saw, I know …

as for this year’s picks, let’s give it some time before pronouncing Pioli the greatest Draft Guru ever, let’s wait until we hit 8-8 before claiming the team “fixed” or that Haley (or Weis/Crennel) are the bestest ever ever ever

Imagine this….

Chargers Defensive Coordinator walks in the room. Looks at his defense. Kind of shrugs and sighs. “Ok, guys….We are about to have our first game of the season. It doesn’t get any bigger than Monday night. We are going to Arrowhead which will be jammed packed. We have to figure out how to defend Jamaal Charles, Thomas Jones, Dexter McCluster, Dwayne Bowe, and oh yeah, Chris Chambers.” Half the defense walks out…

Teams that go against us won’t think it’s another bye week! They will actually go home and night trying to go to sleep. They will have to game plan all week and struggle with how to cover all our weapons. I LOVE THIS!

these speed additions create mismatches all over the field. Special teams was vastly improved & our terrible secondary was shored up bigtime….a necessity in today’s fast-paced, pass-oriented league. These guys aren’t gonna get burned by Vincent Jackson all game long. We still need some run stoppers though.

I was reading comments from the 3rd shift and decided that I wanted to write a positive piece, so I went to the Fan Posts to check to make sure that I was not duplicaing, and read this. Great stuff, and Rec’d.

I would append that I really feel like getting great value at Guard is being overlooked. Lilja is a good pass-blocking guard, but not very good at run-blocking. That does not describe a right guard to me, it sounds more like a left guard. That upgrade will also help center, which also helped itself. All of this helped Cassle.

Cam Thomas anyone?

Funniest thing I’ve read all day. Ran a 4.56 at the combine but, if there was ever a better example of “football speed” it’s Dexter McCluster. Go to NFL.com and watch the film on him at the Senior Bowl. Ri. Diculous.

sure its great work however

What I was arguing yesterday. They drafted speed and play-making. You can’t pick that up in FA’s. Veterans will be coming down the road to fill in some other gaps. This will turn out very well. Anyone who thought a super bowl roster would be drafted is just crazy. The talent level just went up and so did competition for spots. Makes the whole team better.

Can’t say we will suck for next year until our roster is set in September. In November everyone was saying we had to draft 3-4 OL. Not too many cared about that when the draft started because of FA. It all works together.

So Im just going to assume that since its by Kray that its retarded and nonsense.

Now turn on the lights at Arrowhead, and let Berry lay the wood to Sproles like Ray Lewis did last year to end the game and get the season started on a good note.

just want to point out a couple things however….

okung is replacing a recently retired walter jones, so there is no one to pick up from that move, but I get what you’re saying and totally agree. vets will get cut and we will be on the floor to eat them up like a homeless man.

also, Cassell had a pretty good line and randy moss and welker to throw to. yeah, they went 11-5, but cassell basically gave up the same amount of sacks…..hope weis can change that….

we have a lot of versatility and it will make for creative play calling. should be fun to watch.

glad that our return game is going to be addressed.

it is still to be seen how we stop other teams’ te from going over the middle to pick up every third and long….

perhaps just having crennel will help this.

still, optimism is abundant. can’t wait to see the UDFAs and the soon newly free agent additions!

All about the process!

It has that perfect blend of insight and insanity that I always look forward to reading in your posts. I understand why some people are upset that we didn’t grab an inside ILB and NT. But I’m convinced that Pioli, Haley, and Hunt have a plan and they are executing.

Just an observation

though a small correction – Seattle has their incumbent LT retiring, so they won’t need to cut anyone to make room for Okung.

I totally agree that this was a GOOD draft. No, we didn’t take the people that most would think are building blocks of a normal team, because WE’RE NOT MAKING A NORMAL TEAM. Weis and Crennel have devious plans to remake the Chiefs into their image of a new style the NFL has never seen before, and is unprepared to deal with.

Obviously, Crennel is satisfied with Smith (his guy) at NT and told Pioli not to draft one. McCluster is just the man for Weis. The Arenas pick baffles me, but that just means Crennel got some crazy shit cookin up that I’m not foreseeing.

The Chiefs are, at very least, very very entertaining again.

Agree 110%

You don’t have to be satisified to not like a draft prospect. KC didn’t draft an OL prospect last year until the later rounds, and spend the whole year showing just how unsatisfied with the O-line they were.

He didn’t rebuild..he destroyed

+1

hitching my wagon to individual players and not a “team” vision. of course, it doesn’t help when the team is more secretive and guarded than area 51 and fort knox combined. but, this year does give a lot more insight what the powers that be want to do. looking at this draft without much emotion, looking at the players KC picked up…they aren’t trying to build a good team, they are trying to build a DYNAMIC team, and that’s exciting.

i don’t always agree with Kray’s POV, but, taking his FanShot last night, spending the time looking at the 4 young men KC is entrusting the franchise’s future with, i think he’s absolutely correct.

inside out. he clearly took the sexy weapons and maybe was thinking a little outside the box with haley . and try to be a fast and explosive team .

couldnt agree more and rec’d!

I don’t always agree with you but I really like what you have written here. Great work

i THINK that if Sproles was allowed to visit KC, he wouldn’t have left, he would be a Chief. KC’s FO wanted that kind of player, and they got one, maybe one that can be better than Sproles, in McCluster. McCluster is absolutely amazing to watch.

Cassel now has the rope to either help himself or hang himself. this IS the year for Cassel, without excuses, i think he HAS to be excited and thankful.

Holy shit guys, I’m so excited…

a whole lot more as time goes on.

I have to humbly disagree on one major point. As a fan, I’m not in the mood to absolve Haley or Pioli for making some major blunders. While I agree that letting Chan go was the right move, I agree that many of the major decisions that they made were for the betterment of the team in the long run. I think they make a bunch of rookie GM and coaching mistakes early when they pretty much blundered the timing on everything. There’s no way they didn’t see the need for some of those changes day one. They wasted too much time looking for short-term stop-gap solutions when they knew it would ultimately need to be dismantled by a scorched earth approach. They didn’t. Instead they wrung their hands in indecision and didn’t really get themselves going until two weeks before the regular season started. It was their first black-eye as the new regime and it pissed a bunch of us fans off.

Now, having said that, I agree that Haley has something unique in mind and I think that he and Pioli see perfectly eye-to-eye on how to build it. The good news is that we’re now over the hump in terms of going through the changes that were all a part of those last minute changes last year. I think the organization with its fully rounded-out brain-trust feel they’re in a different place that we fans do. We’re looking in from the outside and they threw us for a loop with this draft. I get that.

They went for immediate impact type of players because they must feel that their foundation pieces are in place. To me this draft shows a huge amount of optimism by the Chiefs organization. Well… If they’re right, then the team should be better than many of us fans think they are and we should all be happily surprised by season’s end. Nothing would be better for Chief’s Nation. So I guess that means that Pioli, Haley, Weiss and Crennel have a lot to prove.

By the way, rec’d for the post. Nice work.

plug them in . but if you have crazy x factor weapons maybe you can build around them.

I was scratching my head trying to figure out what the hell we were doing drafting a RB with 2a when we have JC and just signed Thomas Jones….i was thinking that the RB position was pretty solid…there was a lot of talent still left to not fill a POS…IMO
Then to draft a DB and then another S…

Oh well, Im not a GM….but it wasnt my vision of what was going to happen…I like the players they selected, I just thought there would be more of an emphasis on LB,NT, and WR…..

we needed to be bad a few years before we could be great. Thank god clark hunt is a man who surrounds himself with the right people. Papa would be proud of you

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xQNWRhJZ7PU

Pioli has let it be known what we he plans on doing. He plans on winning and getting us to the Superbowl NOW. Not build our team and in a year or 2 have the SB window then close. He’s building us for winning NOW, immediately, and for a long time. He’s not building, he’s adding to a team that is about to be a winner.

This is exactly how I feel. As rabid fans we all THOUGHT we knew what this team needed. We were wrong. Pioli & Co just infused our team with playmakers. We just became one, if not the most, dangerous teams in our division.

So many different ways for us to make plays. I’m ready.

I wasn’t thrilled by several picks and kept thinking we NEED Golden Tate, a NT, and LB’s right NOW! And when we didn’t get those I was kinda disappointed. Way to shed some new positive light and give a different perspective. Well done sir, well done.

I agree with a lot of the post but not every player we draft can play every position. Berry playing RB and Arena’s playing wildcat. Why not have dorsey play FB and Dj play RB. Yes McCluster will play RB and in the slot but don’t kid yourself if we are going to put our #5 Safety anywhere but safety or DB. We did get a little faster in 3 positions but we still have the slowest LB’s in the NFL and unless the line improves we have a front seven that has trouble stopping the run and is slow. Ok teams won’t be able to break 50 yard runs but they will get 4 – 8 yards everytime.

OK what we have improved – We have a solid O-line and we can address the Tackle position next year if needed. We have an versital offense now. We have one of the best young secondries in the league. We do have a very good coaching staff. But Romeo and Wies did not do to good when on teams without a lot of talent. So we will see how they do with this team.

Excellent post! We only have a foretaste of the feast to come from the Chiefs. Man I wish I was a ticket holder.

playmakers, we now have them on the field at all times. Can’t wait for the chargers

But after i did more research on the players we picked , and watch some video on them, it made me realize just how good we did do. Thanks to Kray for the great post, it helped me calm down some and be happy with the players we did get, even though they weren’t the SEXY picks we all wanted, or most of us that is. A lot of people forget that we still can address those other positions of need thru the FA market or undrafted players, one of whom is Micah Johnson.

Kray’s post was just terrific. Now, adding TE Moeaki adds yet ANOTHER piece, for truly extraordinary offensive possibilities, if the O-line holds up as well as I think it will. Cassell should thrive in just this type of offense; he may need a second more in the pocket than some quarterbacks, but he has the skills to be an excellent quarterback (perhaps not elite). Moeki gets downfield much better than most TEs and is a sure-handed receiver. And a tough guy, too. He may be the real surprise in this fascinating draft; potentially an outstanding TE. His multiple injuries caused him to drop in draft, but they apparently all were minor, unrelated to each other, and hopefully not indicative of injury proneness. Hey, Pioli does have some idea what the real score is with players at Iowa….

Krayfish: You rock!. I’ve been saying the EXACT same thing. I have to admit I didn’t understand the picks at first either, but after they passed up on NT a few times, I finally got it thru my thick head they were staying the the one they picked up in FA. No, he isn’t a long term solution. They’ll snag another one in a year or two, but he HELPS FOR NOW.

As we all know, we have too many needs to fix in even two drafts, let alone one. One graphic they posted briefly during the draft is that our previous picks weren’t that great…21 aren’t even still playing in the NFL. Sorry, I caught it on the screen late, and didn’t see what the timespan was, but we all know it wasn’t too long. Hell, of the 34-35 or so players we got rid of last year, isn’t it like only 4-5 or 6 still in the NFL? The rest are bagging groceries.

Another thing I caught when the NFL announcers were discussing the Jon Asamoah (G) pick…HE PRACTICED A LOT AT CENTER. Look for him to show up at RG and C; maybe even as Wiegman’s eventual replacement. The thing I liked the most about him, they said he was NASTY. We need someone like that up front to bounce a few on their asses.

I also agree with field position on change of possession being so so critical. Put Dexter McCluster on one side and Javier Arenas on the other side for kickoffs—- now who you going to kick it away from?

The NFL is changing, and both Pioli and Haley have talked about it, and you touched on it also krayfish. Big time on the pass and trick formations such as the wildcat. If we don’t change we’re toast before we even get started. I’d sure hate to be the opposing DC when we line up with our new line and have JC and Thomas in the back field, McCluster in the slot, Moeaki as the blocking?? TE, let alone Chambers and Bowe as wideouts…who you gonna double? Whoever the single coverage guy is will take it to the house, or at a min, get a chunk.

But that’s only if we want too, because with the RB’s we’ve amassed and the blockers to launch them, we’re gonna pound the ball boys and girls. I’m on the bandwagon that Cassell isn’t the second coming of Montana, but he doesn’t need to be in this arrangement. He only needs to be competent and intelligent. He is both. Give him that ONE EXTRA second to analyze the play before he pulls the trigger and his picks will drop and his critical down completions will come up. We all watched the games last year. The guy was running for his life the 1st half of the season. Put the TE Moeaki and McCluster over the middle, or handoff to McCluster and have him toss it to Moeaki over the middle…yardage is coming in chunks just like a few years ago. Too many looks, and too many options out of each one. Also, McCluster and Moeaki can both stay home and pick up the blitz, provided the opposition can get by our new O line.

I agree about Chan Galey too. Galey is a master at making lemonade, if you catch my drift, and I think he will really shock the Bill’s fans this year (in a good way.) BUT, if you’re trying to changeover to something new, you gotta install it and see who can adapt to the new arrangements. I don’t think Chan was onboard with that. You take any pro team and install a new offense two weeks before the regular season and see how many do exactly what we did—-fire drill city. 45 sacks last year, yeah that sucked. BUT, there were only 15 the last 8 games. Extrapolate that to 16 games (30 sacks), and we’re back in the top 10. The O was catching on.

As you alluded to, with the offensive minds of Haley and Weis back together, I can’t wait for some of the new twists they’re gonna turn loose…starting with Monday Night Football!! Clark Hunt is making this game a special event, and while normally I would think the gameplan would be not to unleash all the hounds early in the season, I’m guessing this is a game they’re gonna target as “We’re HEEERREE!”

And the thing I like the most, they’re gonna play the best 53. Period. I loved what Haley said when telling players who they were competing against “You’re not just competing with these guys, you’re competing with the entire NFL, cause if we can get a better guy in here, we’re gonna do it.”

Anyway, its nice to finally read something that (in my mind at least) agrees with what I see happening. I have to scratch my head with those who’re up in arms immediately because the pick didn’t match their board. Yes, we all have a passion for this game, that’s why we’re here. Please take a half-second and remember Pioli and company are long on experience, have the pedigree, and are highly accredited in what they do for a living. THey have scouts. We are not and do not. (NOTE: That’s not taking anything away from some of the AWESOME research and posts that I’ve seen here!!) Pioli, Inc. is just getting started. Yes, they’re putting fingers in the dike in some instances, what would you have them do? They are shoring up some positions (O line for instance), and will come back and address them top to bottom later. Our D was like swiss cheese last year, can’t keep putting our weak O in a hole all the time.

As I stated somewhere else not too long ago. This staff has over 20 (21-22?) Superbowl rings in the jewelery box. Unmatched anywhere else in the NFL (afaik). They took over a franchise totally in the tank and heading downward at a high rate of speed.

 Don’t they deserve at least a bit of time to prove they f’ed the pooch before we publically crucify them here? We’re not trying to sell papers like JW for crissakes! The one thing I look to from the 09 season as an improvement over years past…they never gave up. They were flying around like madmen trying to make a play. Over 80 plays on D in the Philly game, and yes they finally ran out of steam, but for a team to stay in it that long, hey, my hat is off to the players as well as the staff for instilling that pride. One thing Haley made good on, He took 22 guys off the street and won 4 games…

And finally, while I usually like JC Peason’s commentary on things, I have to take issue with him on his negativity on this years draft. Yes, we just about to a man picked leaders and team captains as our picks. JC correctly stated that rookies are told “You’re a rookie, we don’t care if you were a team captain in college, this is the NFL, shut the F up.” and “team captains are nice, but they don’t hold weight if they’re not playing.” I agree, but how many team captains are benchwarmers and NOT players? Team captains are routinely the best players on the team. My words to JC are “JC I like ya man, but if you’re such a good talent evaluator, why aren’t you coaching or scouting somewhere?” Whole lot more $$ there vs. calling games from the pressbox.

Yes, I’m in the koolaid, and it comes in several flavors thank you. I prefer the 5% 55 calorie version myself :)

Rec’d Kray…awesome stuff. I agree 100%. We made some major steps forward. Not having to spend picks on linemen except Jon “Asamaousohoasjah” has made room for fast, smart, football players who are all difference makers in their own right…by the way…did you see the video of our new OG? The guy engages a DL and then holds him back with one hand while taking on another guy with his other hand. This guy is a beast to be sure.

Great Draft!!!! Friends 2010 is gonna be a great year!

SooooppppeerrrrBoooooooowwwwlllll!

you hear the words of truth. Thanks Kray. It is way past time for this truth to be told.

Rec’d.