One of the things I liked from the Kansas City Chiefs on Sunday came with the return of WR Dexter McCluster. I noticed the Chiefs ran a similar play multiple times with McCluster as a decoy running an end-around. QB Matt Cassel would hand off to RB Jamaal Charles, or drop back to pass, but he wasn't giving it to McCluster.
Until about six and a half minutes left in the third quarter when the ball actually did go to McCluster on one of those end-arounds and it worked like a charm. McCluster cut his way across the field 57 yards to the Denver Broncos nine yard line.
The problem: WR Terrance Copper was flagged for holding on the play nullifying the whole thing. But KC set themselves up for that play all day and -- absent the hold -- it worked pretty well. I thought the plan behind that from the coaching staff was smart and simple.
Chiefs head coach Todd Haley had some interesting words on Monday about the playcalling indicating that it may be simpler than we think.
"Going back to the first time against Denver when we talked about getting back to fundamentals, one of the things that I wanted to make sure that we did was...Just running the runs that we think are good runs and throwing the passes that we think are good passes and then just changing formations to run the same plays. That is what we have done real well here and staff wise we have done a really good job plan wise."
OK, maybe it's not simple (not by any means) but on many levels it makes sense -- do what works best, right?
I think this mentality falls to the defensive side of the ball in some degree. We've heard DE Shaun Smith say a a couple of times that Romeo Crennel will throw something out if the players don't like it. He makes a simple (yet effective) game plan and use every player as effectively as possible.