No Stone Left Unturned: A 2017 Starting Point
By David Bell
Well he!! Chiefs fans, we went through it all last season, didn’t we?
We watched a highly talented team suffer injury after injury and they kept on winning… somehow. No, they didn’t win the post season game versus the Steelers but yes, they did win twelve games. Yes, they did win the division. Also, the Raiders would not have beaten the Chiefs in 2016 – it was a team with too many shortcomings that lost their QB. That is what I believe.
Let me go on from that point to illustrate all that happened in 2016. The Chiefs so-called stellar running back was a no-show. The Chiefs stellar WRs were a basic no-show. The Chiefs standard, everyday fit ILB was a no show (Josh Mauga). During the season, the Chiefs lost both starting Defensive ends and a starting Guard (Jaye Howard, Allen Bailey, and Parker Ehinger). They lost their superstar ILB late in the season (Derrick Johnson), right when he was needed for post season play — and they were positioned in post season just fine, thank you very much. Our guys were dinged up as any team usually is and still they won 12 games.
THAT ROSTER IS STILL LARGELY INTACT.
A review of the teams ups and downs can be summed up with a couple of losses that should have been – one of them taking place at Arrowhead at ZERO DEGREES. I was at that game with a friend and remarked that there were things going on on the field that didn’t make sense. Hali was starting and hobbled all through that game. The pass rush was suffering. The NT didn’t do much to aid the rush nor the run stopping effort. The offense was totally anemic. One Field Goal and the game was history. It was a game at home that should have been a win. Of course, at the same time you can dink a field goal and win a game we easily could have lost (in Denver). Every season is like that for almost every team.
THE CHIEFS WON TWELVE GAMES
Luckily, the Chiefs offensive line was deep. There were two men who had had starting roles the previous two season to get at least the basic snaps done with some efficiency: Zach Fulton and Jah Reid. When Parker Ehinger went down for the count, the Chiefs still had two men who had started and who had been around for at least a year. In some ways, losing Parker Ehinger demonstrated the depth of the offensive line and this is a huge plus. Another year of experience for our Guard/Center and ditto using Reid as a Swing Tackle. Was it great? Absolutely not. But the numbers that Ransom shared in his three models piece does tell a tale. The offensive line wasn’t as bad as we tend to think and the offensive performance wasn’t awful. It was middle of the road type stuff.
So why wasn’t it better?
Recall the season and the game commentary and game reviews among all of the Arrowheadone.com “experts”, week after week? Somewhere after game four, I was constantly stating that something was wrong with Reid’s play-calling. This was the “Continuity” factor for me.
But it is deeper than this. The more I thought about it, the more I decided that the offense was just plain unable to exploit the weaknesses of the defense and apparently there was some factor there where Alex Smith would not throw the ball to an open WR or RB. Period.
Failure to Exploit
The failure to exploit during the flow of the game seemed to me to loom as a shadow.
What do I mean here? Game after game I watch the offense start up and stall. Or go three and out. Or get to the 47(opponents) and fail to convert after 3 successive first downs. At first, early in the season I was scratching my head wondering why the Chiefs offense did not “Flow”… and then, game after game I watched closely the play-calling and sequences of plays and all to often, there would be an Andy Reid “We’ll trick them up” play and it would force a 3rd and long–see Seth Keysor’s variations when looking at different components of the offense. The failure was Reid’s inability to get the offense on top and create a rhythm that would utilize their strengths and minimize the weaknesses.
Where Alex Smith would use the interdependent route trees of a particular play and then, see the open receiver and pass that man the ball, it just didn’t happen enough. Sure, Maclin was your #1 target. First, he went hobbling after being out and then something was going on with him that was “just not right”. At the same time, the play-calling had route trees for Chris Conley and Conley was winning a big share of the time against his opponent and he didn’t even catch the eye of Smith. They had Wilson and Wilson, when in the game, seemed to me to be a constant non-factor. I watched him break off routes and give up.
Or, late in the season, with one of the most dynamic play-makers, albeit a newcomer, his energy and skill was used in Andy’s stupid diversion schematic, where Hill ran wind-sprints behind the QB.
Am I critiquing Andy Reid here? You betcha. Andy Reid in Philly found ways to shoot himself in the foot with his play calling. In Kansas City, he is doing the same dang thing.
Chris Conley
As far as I am concerned, the player of focus in the Playoff game for the aerial attack should have been Chris Conley with a solid mix of Kelce and Hill. There were games (probably two but perhaps three), when the most dynamic TE in the NFL was largely ignored. Chris Conley, all season long, had games where he would get open and he was not targeted in the offense – because of Andy Reid’s offense.
Am I saying Conley is great? Nope. He still has things to learn but there were several games where he had routes that exploited the defense, or, the defender made a choice to cover one way and Conley burst out wide open to end up with a Keysor Neutral Play. I am using Conley as an example. He has, as Keysor observed, weaknesses. But he has strengths as well. The problem is, that Reid’s play-calling does not position him to use his strength and have the other inter-dependent routes build a win-win with the QB finding the open receiver instead of a rotational sequence of looks.
Keysor makes this observation about Reid’s offense as it relates to a particular WR(in this case, Conley).
“… another interesting thing to note was the number of neutral snaps. Andy Reid’s offense is predicated on route combinations creating opportunities for WRs against various defensive coverages. Because of that, wide receivers are often not “winning” or “losing” on their own, but are instead benefiting (or at times being harmed) from defenses being forced to choose between leaving one player or another open. It’s fun to watch, actually.”
Once I began to see the routes as structures, I began to see the structures as lacking in the cohesion necessary to find success after success. Then I would see Andy do another cutesy play and that would blow a drive out of the water.
Failed Exploitation – Albert Wilson
There is not much to say about “Bert.” I like the man, but his play essentially does nothing to support his use by Andy Reid. I am not going to analyze it, or even go back to recall what it was that made me stop even considering him but it was a single game. He broke off a route, he rounded off and slowed, he didn’t go to contest the ball and didn’t find an open spot when Smith was scrambling. Then he had two drops. Yes, this is the game where he scored a TD late after all the other things had occurred.
Exploitation Unborn – Demarcus Robinson
Because I believe so firmly that Wilson’s use is due to his familiarity with the offense and playbook, that opportunity to spot snaps for “X” Robinson was not even considered. This is merely my view, but with JMac hobbled and under-performing, why was this not part of the game plan, the player growth plan? It doesn’t make sense.
Reid, Critique #2
Critique number two of Andy Reid’s inability to adjust his own play-calling on the fly is exactly as noted above. He calls plays that make no sense to what the defense is offering him. Keep in mind that this happened to Kelce as well.
Reid’s complicated WCO is so fubar the team cannot match the output of it’s 2013 team and think about that: Yes, they had Charles and yes Hunt should fit well with the RB-as-Receiver, but they had Bowe and Wilson. That is quite obvious to me, a lackluster combination of there ever was one.
In 2016, the offense was able to overcome enough of the defense to win. Juxtaposed to this, the defense was only blown out of a single game: The Steelers.
There are two things which are true of the Chiefs basic game. The defense held the opposing offense below their average point production and that allowed the Chiefs offense to score enough to win.
Of course, this does not factor in Defensive Scoring but that is the advantage of having a top defense isn’t it?
How The Chiefs Improved (with just one addition)
This is a somewhat nebulous category. Additions were made to the roster, which position by position matches up to most NFL teams as the superior team with depth. As the season wears on, and other teams cannot trust to rest their players in the flow of a game, the Chiefs are sitting in the catbird seat.
Without adding players (save one), the Chiefs improve themselves for 2017 by having healthy players back to their anticipated starting jobs. Ehinger is back at Guard and this gives the offensive line a seven-deep look and possibly eight. The Chiefs gained valuable experience on the defensive front three as well. Both Chris Jones and Rakeem Nunez-Roches were tempered in the flame so to speak. With Bailey back, the front three should be set – but here they added Ben Logan as well (this is my single addition which adds a player from outside the roster in this missive).
In 2016, a CB stepped up and played well down the stretch enough to at least anticipate that the CB situation is going to be “solid” because of Terrance Mitchell. The safeties are already set. For the LBs, inside and out, Houston is back as is DJ and we have young LBs that had their appetites more than whetted.
Team Continuity
Over-all, the Roster is much the same as that which was fielded in 2016. Add back Josh Mauga who did not play in 2016 and this bodes well for the forecast. Hali should be back and not hobbling around. He may no longer be taking 750 snaps, but if he combo’s up with 450 to 500, I can see the outside rush returned. Sure, there are anticipations here that are not yet fact. I haven’t heard the Chiefs back away from statements about recovery, for instance, Houston, Hali, Bailey and so on. They have projected Ehinger out to preseason but the Chiefs have Zach and Jah who can cover it until he has his game legs ready to roll.
I cannot agree with the pundits on the Chiefs 9-or-under-win-season. I would wager money that the Chiefs will win at least 11 and take that right now (Editor’s Note: ArrowheadOne is not a betting site).
The Chiefs are a resilient young team and this also is a factor for 2017. Too, there are a lot of “Chiefs” veterans on the roster. They know one another and have played together, fought and won and lost all together. I think this is of great important to building a winning football team. They all know the other guy and their tendencies and weaknesses.
For this piece, I am leaving out the newcomers who I think will make a difference. Above I mention Hunt but I am truly thinking we will see Kpass and Eligwe emerge during the season and they will be part of the “Winning Solution”. It’s a team game and it takes players in all three phases of the game to win. It is my view that the Chiefs are “this close” (as he hols up his thumb and index fingers), even with that mediocre QB named Alex Smith (whom I still support).
The Three C’s
There is a good mix of youth and experience and one huge advantage is that most of these players have been to war together before. Cohesiveness, Continuity and Constancy go a long way to having success in the NFL. If they stay healthy and Reid’s play-calling improves a couple of percentage points or three, the offense should gel enough to build upon the three “C’s” and win meaningful football games. Young guys come back from a pounding more quickly than an older roster and in this, I am firmly certain is the seedbed of winning the division – and more.
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