Chiefs Coach Says Jamaal Charles Was Banged Up In Raiders Game

One of the story lines coming out of the Kansas City Chiefs 23-20 overtime loss to the Oakland Raiders is once again the distribution of carries between running backs Thomas Jones and Jamaal Charles. This hasn't been much of a topic of conversation since Charles' first three games when he had just 11, 11 and 12 carries.

Charles had 10 carries for 53 yards while Jones had 31 yards on just 19 carries. With a difference in efficiency at that rate it's fair to wonder what's going on.

Haley gives two reasons: the Raiders defense and Charles' injury issues.

"On the carry question," head coach Todd Haley said at his Monday press conference, "you have some plays that are passes that become runs that you don't know for sure what is going to happen."

Haley said this a couple of times on Monday. What I'm taking out of it is that the Raiders lined up to stop the run and the Chiefs at times had to audible into a pass. Remember, the Raiders usually play a lot of man and had times when they were exposed in the passing game.

As to Charles, Haley says, "It's just one of those things that you can't entirely control other than just putting someone in the game and leaving them in the game. And even that you can't control because Jamaal's been fighting through a couple of different issues. I have to take my hat off to Jamaal. He's shown a lot of toughness and fight to get back onto the field but there are times he has to come off. That's as much his decision as anyone else's."

At one point Charles fell on the ball Sunday and was clearly in pain as trainers tended to him. He would return shortly thereafter. Haley doesn't talk about injuries very often so I'm glad he confirmed that Charles was banged up because it gives some insight into what he and Charlie Weis were dealing with.

"He had to come out of the game multiple times yesterday for different physical reasons," Haley said. "That's just the line of a running back and that's something we've talked about in here. But in addition, like I said, you have mutliple audible calls in that can go different ways and you don't know exactly what the play will be, whether it's a run or pass, especially a against a team like Oakland that will show their hand and you're able to do some of that and change the play."

Though he didn't say one way or the other, Haley didn't make it sound like any of the injuries were more than anything out of the ordinary. We'll find out his practice status on Wednesday.