Anyone who was paying attention during Sunday’s game - it’s OK if you started to fall asleep around the fifth of sixth turnover - saw that Dee Ford didn’t play very much. I looked at the snap counts which confirmed that Ford was in for 28 of the 68 snaps. Tamba Hali, who has not been an every-down player this season, played 46 snaps.
I wrote in my recap that unless Ford was hurt then this is a bad look for him. The Chiefs star pass rusher is out, the other one is old (sorry, Tamba) and a third year first round pick is playing fewer than half the snaps? Not good.
Apparently, Ford was hurt. Chiefs coach Andy Reid was asked on Monday about Tamba playing more and he said this:
“Dee Ford got banged up a little and had to come out,” Reid said via quotes from the Chiefs. “Tamba got more time there, and we’ve been easing him a little more each of the last few games. We’re not going to give him an entire game at this point -- that’s not where he’s at. We want him to be here and be productive the whole year.”
This caught my eye because Andy Reid starts off all of his press conferences with injuries and on Sunday he didn’t mention Ford being hurt. It’s unusual that a player would be hurt enough to come out of the game but Reid doesn’t mention it. Something to monitor next week.