ChiefsPlanet - Chiefs Babb: Chiefs wide receiver Chambers frustrated by time on bench

Chiefs wide receiver Chambers frustrated by time on bench
By KENT BABB
The Kansas City Star

The last two weeks felt familiar to Chris Chambers. Once a pillar of his team’s offense, he has since been phased out.

Maybe it’s temporary. Maybe it’s not.

“You kind of don’t know what the coaches are thinking,” Chambers said Monday. “Or what their expectations are of you and where their confidence is.”

Chambers, the Chiefs’ 32-year-old veteran wide receiver, said being inactive against Houston and Jacksonville felt similar to what he experienced last November, when San Diego released him after a disappointing first half of his ninth season.

There wasn’t much of an explanation then, Chambers said, when he was reportedly pulled from the weight room and told about being let go. And he said there hasn’t been much conversation this time, either; he said the Chiefs told him about 90 minutes before kickoff Sunday that he wouldn’t be in uniform against the Jaguars.

“Frustrating,” Chambers said. “I was pretty much going to start warming up.”

About 24 hours later, he sat at his locker with a bandage covering his left ring finger. Chambers suffered a severe dislocation, he said, on the first play of the Chiefs’ loss at Indianapolis three weeks ago. He was taken to the locker room, where the finger was “jiggled” back into place, Chambers said, and he returned and finished with two catches for 23 yards against the Colts.

He hasn’t played since, and coach Todd Haley said last week that Chambers wasn’t yet healthy but that he could’ve played against Houston. This week, Haley said the team’s plan against Jacksonville centered on getting as many healthy and versatile players on the 45-man game-day roster. Considering Chambers’ finger was not yet healed and he doesn’t offer the Chiefs much help on special teams, the team kept him on the sideline.

“We need everybody,” Haley said. “There are opportunities when one guy is maybe not 100 percent, that we can have opportunities to get other guys in the mix and playing and developing.”

Chambers, a former second-round pick from Wisconsin, said his finger is improving and he’ll try to think of these last two weeks as a chance to get healthy. What he won’t think of it as, he said, is punishment for the growing concern that Chambers is a player who gets a new contract and then lets up on effort.

In 2004, Chambers signed a five-year extension with Miami worth $30 million — a substantial raise. That season, Chambers had fewer receiving yards and touchdown catches than the year before. After averaging more than 900 yards in his first five seasons, Chambers had more than 900 receiving yards just once over his next four.

He was in the last year of that contract in 2009 when the Chargers cut him and the Chiefs picked him up. Whatever his motivation — the need of a new deal, responding to being slighted in San Diego or something different — Chambers answered by being the Chiefs’ best receiver in their final nine games, averaging 16.9 yards per catch and having his best season since 2007.

The Chiefs signed him to a three-year contract before this season, a reward and an insurance policy. All Chambers had to do was keep doing what he did in ’09.

He insisted Monday that his slow start — he has seven catches for 76 yards in four games this season — has nothing to do with money.

“I’ve had good contracts throughout my career,” he said. “I just want to end my career on top, with a team that’s winning, with a team that has an opportunity to make the playoffs and do something special.”

Chambers said he doesn’t think the Chiefs will release him; he added that it wouldn’t make sense to cut a player with his experience — including playoff appearances. Haley indicated that Chambers probably would be back in uniform soon.

Haley said Chambers used his time wisely Sunday, standing on the Chiefs’ sideline and helping to guide their young receivers as they walloped the Jaguars.

“He’s very competitive; he wanted to be playing,” Haley said. “He … really helped with all our young receivers and did a great job. Hopefully this week he’ll be back in there and contributing.

“I have high expectations for Chris. … His arrow is still pointing up. I want this to be his best year that he’s ever had, and that’s what he’s focused on. Unfortunately, he had a little setback. He’ll be back and, I believe, contributing in a big way, because I know it means a lot to him.”

Chambers said that, regardless of his frustration Sunday and the unpleasant sequence from last year that it reminded him of, he expects to play this week against Buffalo.

“One thing I don’t want to do is get out there and not be on the same page as everybody else. So I’ve got to work back from scratch almost,” he said. “That’s the feeling I’ve got to take. I’ve got a longer season ahead of me. Hopefully I can get back in the lineup and work things out.”