Josh Kingsley

It’s getting real, y’all. The CHIEFS played a game last Sunday! Sure it was a preseason game, but an indication of something bigger: one down, two to go. The preseason is effectively a box check exercise in general, but ever more so for a highly established team like the CHIEFS. Sure, there are roster spots up in the air, and preseason games provide the best change a player has to showcase his why me. In the CHIEFS’ case it is more about guys fighting their way into spots as opposed to a bevy of open competitions.

The preseason games have varying effects on fans, analysts and fanalysts (new title I’m giving myself – certain I didn’t coin anything). Effects range in the level of care around score, stats, eye tests, etc. I tend to see a selective level of caring. The best example is the score. Many fans have the tendency to play up the contest after good results and down after bad. The CHIEFS landscape appears divided into three camps after preseason game one:

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1. There is nothing to learn from that or any preseason game, just keep the injuries at a minimum.
2. I saw some good and concerning things in that game, and hope to see progress in the second preseason game.
3. The CHIEFS are in serious trouble and preseason week one confirm my greatest fears.

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I got into this a bit in my latest podcast episode. The player for full effect is below, but I can summarize my thoughts in the next sections (100:29).

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What Did That Game Really Mean?

This really starts and ends with one thing: a trip to the Big Easy. As a fanalyst (this will stick), I had an opportunity to see my team in a fun city for cheap, but didn’t. Why? Mainly because I have zero interest of being there in August, February was borderline too hot for me. I also have weddings most weekends, and this past one was no exception. Plus, friends from KC came to visit. I categorize myself 80% group two, 20% group one. Group three completely exists and contains all the folks that believe Jones and Hopkins should be playing preseason games. I understand where they are coming from, and simply don’t share the sentiment. No player is bigger than the team and hard cap Veach must manage, and we have a competent WR room. Is there risk in these stances? Sure, but there’s also risk leaving the house.

Point being life and business move regardless of personal readiness. Back to that point shortly. My approach to preseason game one was lazer focus on the first couple series each way, passive watching/following after, and highlight and box score review. In short, what is Reid showing and what are the starters doing?

First Series Each Way

The Saints and their new QB, Derek Carr, took the ball first. Carr looked sharp, Alvin Kamara looked dangerous as ever, and Michael Thomas looked like he wanted to be there. Those all take a step to confirm my belief the Saints are the class of the NFC South. New Orleans scored the first drive fairly easily. Zeroing on the Chris Jones absence makes total sense if you already believe it. Claiming both units played vanilla ball with the Saints vanilla O > CHIEFS vanilla D works too. My belief: the Saints vanilla O looked sharp and polished, but we didn’t really get to see the CHIEFS D settle and adjust. One play truly stood out.

The Saints lined up first and goal at the four at the end of the first drive. Michael Thomas ran a fade route to the left. Joshua Williams matched him step for step, turned his head at the exact correct moment, and spiked the ball to the ten like a volleyball outside hitter. Word from camp is Williams and Watson look awesome at corner. That play made me a believer. One of my podcast co-contributors, Dwayne (brother of Derrick) Johnson, noted McDuffie looking slow. Those are my two watch items for week two.

The offense took the field, featuring Clyde Edwards-Helaire snagging a first down, and left the field after a failed TE sneak. I’m certain Reid has better ideas for 4th-and-1, so — whatever — on the Bell play which the whole stadium saw coming. As for the CEH heaviness it means one of three things:

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1. He is part of Reid’s offensive plan this season.
2. Reid was window dressing for Veach to sell.
3. Absolutely nothing.

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The answer is most likely three, and CEH was the vanilla double scoop. However, it may be one.

New Friends in the WR Room

No one did more for themselves than Nikko Remigio, undrafted WR from Fresno State. The dude was everywhere for the late offenses. I mentioned early that players can fight their way into the roster spot competition space. Remigio did just that, and then took a practice injury. That probably kills his chances at the 53, but we have not heard the last of him.

Richie James made his mark as well with two catches for 44 yards. All but one of those yards came on the 43 yard catch from Blaine Gabbert, and the single yard was a TD grab. Look at James get open (see below, 0:08)!

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The real fireworks came when the heralded Justyn Ross caught a 15 yd TD from Buechele.

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QB Competition?

Speaking of Shane Buechele… are we sure he has no shot at the backup spot? I don’t find it likely, but cannot find it impossible. What I really expect is Gabbert holds it down in ’23 keeping the seat warm, and Shane takes the gig starting in ’24. Reid has built some depth and value at the position.

Relevant Soccer Side Bar

I’ve written multiple times of my love of soccer, and my favorite club, English Premier League’s Tottenham Hotspur. Additionally, I have mentioned the name Harry Kane. Kane, along with Patrick Mahomes and NASCAR’s Jimmie Johnson, sits in my top three favorite athletes. They are contemporary, but also top anyone from my childhood. All three guys have a down-to-earth quality. Harry and Patrick married their high school sweethearts. Jimmie married a model like many driver’s, but he also grew up in a trailer and broke his wrist jumping off a golf cart after his first title. Jimmie got me into racing and gave me seven titles to celebrate. Patrick needs no further explanation from a success standpoint. This is where Kane separates himself from the trio.

Check out the honors section of his wiki page. Harry has a ton of individual awards, most notably three EPL and one World Cup Golden Boots for top goal scorer. He has the most goals for Spurs and England. However, he has never been part of a title winning team. I’ll avoid getting into the major weeds and leave it at this: he has three to four annual options to win a trophy. Two are single elimination English cup tournaments, one is the Premier League and the last is a European top team tournament (Euro, or Champions League). Kane led Spurs teams have a few second place spots and not much else.

Defined Ambitions and Such

Soccer coverage is NFL coverage on steroids. First, the game never truly stops. The Premier League runs mid August to mid May, and teams play friendlies during the off season. I mentioned four competitions. A successful English (or Spanish, German, Italian, French) team has a 34-38 game league schedule, will play 3+ cup matches, 3+ Euro league matches in any given season. Every four weeks is schedule off time for national team matches. In short there are matches and news all the time. The US rumor mill around sports is child’s play against soccer coverage. Pundits write off teams weekly based on performances and hype them back up a month later. Every player is leaving every team and going somewhere else. Player X is the best/worst based on how many goals, assists…and trophies accumulated.

The Transfer Windows

Soccer players sign contracts with clubs. These include weekly wages, sometimes incentives, multiple years and often release clauses. Soccer (not MLS BTW – nothing to learn following their process) moves players via transfers. Free agency is not really a thing, all trades. There is a winter and summer window. Any player on any team can join any other team provided two things: the player agrees to any new terms and the clubs agree on a transfer fee. That’s it. I mentioned a release clause. That is a contract specified amount for a club to buy a player. If player X has a $10M release any club can trigger during the window and simply assumes the contract from current club.

More common is a market valuation transfer fee, and a new contract with higher wages for the player. Most big name players transfer when they “outgrow” their club or wages, or near the end of their contract and don’t plan to renew (because of the outgrow usually).

Kane to Bavaria

I bring all this up because Kane transferred from Tottenham to Bayern Munich. Tottenham last won the EPL in 1961, Bayern won the Bundesliga last season and the ten before it. Plus they have five league cups and two Champions League titles to go with them. Every pundit everywhere for the past five plus years lauded Kane for goals and assist, but panned him mercilessly for lack of trophies. The pressure finally broke him and the Spurs. Tottenham aren’t winning the EPL or UCL anytime soon, the cups are too finicky and lower prestige, and Kane had only a year left on his deal. The Spurs pushed for a new deal, Kane said no, Bayern offered Spurs $110M, and Kane now lives in Germany. The transfer itself took hours, the process built over years.

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A CHIEF-ly Parallel

This situation reminds me Tony Gonzalez. Tony gave the CHIEFS 12 awesome years, rules our hearts, felt like a CHIEFS player for life, tired of the lack of Super Bowls and went to Atlanta to finish his career. Whether we admitted at the time or not we all saw it coming and it made sense. The CHIEFS were no where near contention, the Falcons were, and Tony left the conference. Kane did the same in leaving the country.

Sports Grief ~ Real Grief

Let me preface with this: sports hate does not equal real hate. In the same fashion sports grief and real grief are different. No rational person considers a sports loss greater or equal to losing a loved one. However, the processing is pretty identical. Here is my Kane process.

1. Denial

Harry Kane broke into the Tottenham first team in 2014-15 scoring 31 goals across all competitions. He literally came from nowhere and pundits dubbed him a one-season wonder. The following campaign saw 28 goals, and the third (2016-17) saw 35. All the commentary shifted from him overachieving to “when will he leave Tottenham?” An honest assessment says I knew his departure was more likely than not at that point. Players move and there are way more successful clubs than Spurs.

2. Anger

The talk of Kane leaving sucked. It was all over the rumor mill every single transfer window. I wear my sports fandom on my sleeve, so plenty of fans of other clubs let me have it too. Tottenham is a target among soccer fans, truly an easy “you never win anything” target.

3. Bargaining

Kane signed numerous contracts with Spurs. The most recent a five year deal when the new stadium opened. All the pundits talked of his departure, but Harry stayed. Before the 2021-22 season word broke Kane wanted a move to Manchester City. It never materialized and I believed in the maybe. I always talked myself into ways the Spurs could win…something.

4. Depression

This one was short. The transfer happened late last week, just in time to ship him out before the first match of the season last Sunday. It was not fun watching the match without Kane.

5. Acceptance

I got here quickly. Part of that was my realization of the prior stages. I kind of always knew he would bounce. There are silver linings:

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1. He did not go to another big Premier League club. I’ll spare the football crowd more details than I’ve crammed already and just say many moves in league made sense. Kane cares about his legacy as a Spurs fan growing up, academy player, and ultimate legend. Kane is Spurs for life no matter what, similar to Tony G.
2. Kane will win at Bayern. A lot. And I will root for every single one (unless Tottenham shockingly overachieves and ends up in a UCL match against him).
3. Rumors (AKA fools errands) indicate a potential Tottenham buyback scenario in the contract.
4. Hope. My dream scenario is Kane winning 5+ trophies in two seasons, coming back to Tottenham and breaking the EPL goal record.

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Final Points

I’ve kicked the can on this topic for weeks, but Harry Kane effectively makes me address it. Get to know the five stages because we are in it with Chris Jones. It’s all over in terms of result. He will leave the CHIEFS and play somewhere else. I don’t know when this happens or where he goes, but he’s going. Too much happened. We can deny it, we can be angry, and we can bargain with ourselves there is hope. I no longer hope, and sit at a weird pre-acceptance. My biggest denial here is similar to Tony and Harry: denial of seeing reality. I’ve seen this Jones thing coming for a few seasons. Too many indicators: the Aaron Donald deal, Veach trading Tyreek, multiple year talk of extension, rumors of almost top paid. It goes on. Turning a blind eye on these indicators is denial.

Most fans and fanalyst anger points to Veach not getting this done earlier. That’s great assuming he didn’t present something Jones and his agent refused to sign. I believe Veach offered multiple options and none hit the high number. Many are bargaining that Mahomes and Kelce’s under-value and Jones’ love for the organization ultimately makes this happen. Maybe Veach or Jones blinks. Some sit depressed watching it all play out.

I understand and in many ways agree with Chris. Patrick and Kelce rake endorsements, own businesses, and walk into a post NFL career on whatever screen they want whenever they want. Chris Jones is most likely in the only time in his life he can max his value, so… he should. Veach has a hard cap and long-term vision to play, and should consider that over all else. I hope (potentially bargaining over here) Jones plays this year, balls out, gets tagged, and completes a trade to a rich NFC team.

I can accept that.

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Josh Kingsley — ArrowheadOne and Arrowhead Kingdom

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