Chiefs Super Bowl Loss: Now Laying Blame?

Chiefs Super Bowl Loss: Now Laying Blame? – When a team loses the Super Bowl, there’s sometimes a lot of blame-throwers in the weeks following that loss. That didn’t come through with the Chiefs, as it might with another team, not within the organization anyway. However, that doesn’t mean the Chiefs aren’t making a similar statement as they decide who not to re-sign as well as who they do want to bring back. What’s the saying: look at what they do, not at what they say. Besides, it goes with the territory, as each team attempts to get better, and makes adjustments to their roster every offseason. However, in a year in which a team has blown the biggest game of all, and blown isn’t the proper word, but it’s close… “Blowout” would be more like it. That kind of labeling happens when you lose 31-to-9.

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Some of the changes the Super Bowl LIV Champions made a year ago included moving on from OL Cam Irving, letting TE Blake Bell go in Free Agency and drafting a running back — Clyde Edwards-Helaire — in the first round. Let’s take a closer look at some of those offseason moves a year ago and I’ll give each a rating of: a “+” if it worked out, a “0” if it didn’t move the needle, and a “–” minus sign if it hurt the team.

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While others claim, PMII would not be the same QB if he was with another, lesser, team, that just supports the idea that the match of player-and-coach is critical to their growth. Here, it’s as true as it would be for any other position and not just the Reid-Mahomes connection. Kafka gets major props here as he’s been involved with Mahomes as his QB coach for all of the past three seasons.

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This minus is provisional because, the jury is still out on Charlton’s future value, but for 2020, it’s a

minus. Charlton was a first round pick of the Dallas Cowboys, the 28th overall pick in 2017. Brett Veach get kudos for signing him to a one-year prove-it deal, but in 2020, Charlton did little to prove his worth. However, he did enough to warrant another shot and based upon what we saw, he could end up having a breakout year in K.C… if he can stay healthy. In 2020, he was in on only 8% of the snaps, or in other words, 90 snaps, but… in those snaps, he had 2 sacks. One sack every 45 snaps is very good Chiefs fans. If you recall, Justin Houston had a record year for K.C. in 2014 when he produced 22 sacks and he did that on 1083 snaps, or, 47 snaps to produce each sack. Now, I get that Charlton’s snap count size is too small to be making a full scale evaluation of his future value… yet… but he does deserve another shot, and it could be a really good year for him lining up next to three monster QB Pressure Cookers (Chris Jones, Jarran Reed, and Frank Clark).

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When Emmanuel Ogbah left in Free Agency last year, I initially thought it was a mistake. However, the Chiefs could not afford to match his new salary.

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While the Chiefs could have used another good pass rusher in Super Bowl LV, they essentially couldn’t afford to invest in Ogbah and ended up getting a 5th round compensatory pick for him in this draft, which should help down the road. Consequently, the move, or non-move in this case, was a wash.

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I was hoping for more from the addition of cornerback/special teams player, Antonio Hamilton, but that was pure fantasy. He had 135 snaps for K.C. in 2020, but had 133 snaps the previous year for the NY Giants. So, my expectations, were nothing more than wishful thinking. Antonio Hamilton is now a Free Agent.

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In the 2019 season, DT Mike Pennel was critical to the Chiefs ability to stop the run so, he was brought back last offseason, but his return didn’t help. He had 24 tackles in 154 snaps in 2019 and then 29 tackles in 320 snaps in 2020. That was one tackle every 6.4 snaps in 2019 vs. one tackle every 11 snaps in 2020. He not only did not help, he was part of the problem in 2020, and so, he’s currently a Free Agent.

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The fact that RB Damien Williams opted out had my full support last year but it hurt the chances of K.C. in the long haul. As far as I’m concerned, he was Super Bowl LIV MVP and could have made the Chiefs a much tougher team in the backfield paired with Clyde Edwards-Helaire. Whether anyone supports his opting out, or not, his absence hurt K.C..

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Some will say that when Lucas Niang opted out it hurt the Chiefs last year. While I can admit that his absence may hurt his development for the near future, his absence was negligible in 2020. Yes, he could have stepped in and gotten some critically important experience by replacing either Mitchell Schwartz or Eric Fisher, but it could be argued that if he’d been inserted into the OL lineup for Super Bowl LV, it could have damaged him for the future. Either way, I think K.C. would still have lost the Super Bowl, even if he’d been a major upgrade.

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The Blame-throwing Has Begun

The re-signing — or not re-signing — of the Chiefs own Free Agents this offseason may share some insights into who they think was most to blame for their most recent Super Bowl failure. While I believe Andy Reid and Bret Veach are essentially operating from the standpoint of trying to make the team better at every turn, we should not dismiss the idea that, all the moves they’ve made this offseason are revealing.

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When Joe Thuney was signed it was a clear sign that the offensive line was going to be a major position of reconstruction this offseason. While the signing of Thuney wasn’t necessarily an indictment of Nick Allegretti’s play at LG, it signaled that a new era along the OL has begun as well as making K.C. followers understand that Reid and Veach were as aware of their deficiencies along the OL during the Super Bowl, as fans were. The signing of Kyle Long gets the same uptick as Joe Thuney does. Don’t think it’s less significant. His signing isn’t.

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Chiefs Kingdom needs to have the idea that the Super Bowl LV loss had as much to do with losing these two offensive tackle bookends as anything else. While losing them both in the same season and consequently, offseason, was a huge setback, the release of these two was the right move to make and the first step in signaling that a new OL era was about to begin in K.C..

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With both KPass and Alex Okafor not being re-signed by K.C., it shines a light on the need to have an effective edge rusher. The signing of Jarran Reed will help the DL situation dramatically, but it doesn’t mean Veach won’t go after a very good DE in the upcoming draft. It does, however, mean that KPass and Alex Okafor were part of the problem at DE and the reason why neither were brought back. I see the “non-moves” of possibly bringing them back, as a very good thing for K.C. heading into the 2021 season.

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Andrew Wylie is still on the Chiefs roster. Some like him as a vet who can support a starter, but if he’s ever forced into action again, like he was in Super Bowl LV, the Chief are in serious trouble. Even though K.C. is in a place right now where they need to keep experienced players around until they complete an OL transition, I’m predicting Wylie may be one of those who is no longer with the team in September. Part of the reason for that also has to do with his salary jump. He made $791K in 2018 with K.C. and then $570K in 2019 with the Chiefs, then made $750K last season, but this year his salary jumps to $2.2M. By finding or drafting a replacement for him as a backup, someone who has upside and is developmental, Veach could save over $1.5 million and that could give him leverage to sign a better player at another position when the end of training camp rolls around and all NFL teams are forced to cut down their rosters. I see his presence on the roster as not helpful, even at this point.

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The re-signing of Demarcus Robinson is going to be nearly negligible, like his contributions the past few years. I don’t sense an uptick or a downtick in the teams overall ability to win games because of his presence.

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Yesterday, the Jacksonville Jaguars signed LB Damien Wilson, who started the last two seasons for K.C..

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By not re-signing LB Damien Wilson, Brett Veach and Andy Reid & Co. are basically saying, the Linebacker position was a major weakness in the 2020 season and has to be upgraded this offseason. With no Free Agent LBs of consequence having been signed to take his place thus far, it looks like Veach will be targeting a LB in this year’s draft. I see this move — a non-move — as a huge positive.

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The idea that the Chiefs would keep Watkins this year was problematic. I see it a huge positive that K.C. saw fit to part ways with the oft injured star wideout… not matter how many playoff games he helped win. All parties are to blame for keeping Sammy in-house, but since they decided to not do that this season, it’s huge plus.

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This Draft Class is Excellent

I mentioned to David Bell on Thursday, that I’d misjudged this draft class as a whole, prior to the offseason getting underway. I figured that since so many collegiate conferences had either delayed or canceled their seasons… and… so may prospects in this draft had opted out… that I incorrectly assessed this draft class as being: less than, lower than, or filled with underachievers. Now that I’ve had more than two full months to focus specifically on the strengths, and weaknesses, of this draft, it’s apparent that, nearly every group of position prospects, except maybe the TE position, are a step up and deeper than any draft in recent memory.

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That’s relevant because the LBs in the 2021 draft provide a much longer list of excellent prospects who are fast, and have coverage abilities, than in the draft classes of the past few years. Specifically,Veach can find good LBs in rounds 2-through-4, right where you’d hope he’d make a move for one.

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The return of Blake Bell is a positive for K.C., but it also may signal that Any Reid is going to make a move to utilize more “12 personnel” in 2021 than he did in 2020. I like. the move and it may also say that the TEs that were employed by K.C. last year didn’t do a good enough job. However, some of that responsibility must fall on Andy Reid’s shoulders, for not seeing fit to secure a workable TE in the passing game, someone who could provide a threat that other teams would have to take seriously, of at least respect in their game planning vs the Chiefs offense. I see the return of Blake Bell as a positive, but it also clears up who might be to blame for some 2020 inadequacies at TE. The Chiefs must also be forward thinking about who will eventually step into the shoes of Travis Kelce, but that’s a subject for a different day.

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Now that we have the blame game done with — oh whatever— if Veach can just find a Left Tackle, I’m sure I’ll sleep better at night.

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Laddie Morse — ArrowheadOne

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