Ravens Will Reveal Pioli's Progress

[Hammock Parties]

Ravens Will Reveal Pioli's Progress

We're about to discover just how far the Kansas City Chiefs have come in 16 months under Scott Pioli.

Thirty-one regular season games ago, Pioli's roster was led into Baltimore by Todd Haley for the first game of the new era. Thanks to a pair of game-changing plays from Jon McGraw and Derrick Johnson, the Chiefs kept the final score (38-24) close that day, but were dominated nonetheless.

The Ravens had their way with KC's offense and defense, outgaining the Chiefs 501 -188. The Chiefs couldn't run the ball, failed to stop the run, allowed their starting quarterback to be pummeled and looked like a team that was hopelessly overmatched. They didn't have the talent to compete.

Sobering reality: In Week 17 of the 2010 season, against a team that missed the playoffs, the Chiefs couldn't run the ball, failed to stop the run, allowed their starting quarterback to be pummeled and looked like a team that was hopelessly overmatched. They didn't have the talent to compete.

What if it happens two weeks in a row? Would any logical person come to the conclusion that the Chiefs have truly made significant progress since that first meeting with the Ravens? We'd be hard pressed to feel good about a 10-6 season if the Chiefs resembled the sad-sack unit that started life struggling to win two games with 22 players off the street, wouldn't we?

The Ravens haven't changed much since last season. Joe Flacco, Ray Rice, Derrick Mason and Michael Oher still drive the offense. Ray lewis, Ed Reed, Haloti Ngata and Terrell Suggs contiune to power the defense. Baltimore isn't particularly explosive on offense, but they don't make huge mistakes. Their offensive and defensive schemes are almost identical, implemented by the same coordinators.

The Chiefs? Supposedly, Pioli has performed a complete makeover on the franchise since September 2009. Haley will field 12 new starters Sunday - Matt Cassel, Tony Moeaki, Jamaal Charles, Chris Chambers, Casey Wiegmann, Ryan Lilja, Barry Richardson, Shaun Smith, Derrick Johnson, Jovan Belcher, Eric Berry and Kendrick Lewis.

The Chiefs have new offensive and defensive coordinators. Holdovers from that first game - Dwayne Bowe, Branden Albert - are apparently much improved football players.

For all intents and purposes, it's the same Baltimore team facing a completely different, advertised-as-markedly-improved, Chiefs team. We should expect a completely different result, particularly because the Chiefs will be playing at home.

Specifically we should expect KC's top-ranked rushing attack to test Baltimore's fifth-ranked run defense. We should expect Cassel and Bowe to play at a high level against a secondary that features zero elite cornerbacks and a busted-up Ed Reed. We should expect Romeo Crennel, Tamba Hali and Kansas City's talented secondary to throttle a Baltimore passing game that makes Cassel to Bowe look like Montana to Rice.

These are the expectations the Chiefs have set. We expect them to compete and with a few bounces of the ball going in their favor, expect them to win at home and claim their first playoff victory since January 1994.

So what will it say about Pioli if the Ravens replicate their 2009 dominance? You'd start to wonder if he really deserves much credit at all for Kansas City's 10-6 season and the "rebirth" of the franchise. In the aftermath of a Baltimore Beatdown, the AFC West Division Championship would look like a mirage created by the NFL's easiest schedule, and KC's 2011 opponents - mostly playoff contenders led by stud quarterbacks - would appear daunting.

The bottom line is that a Wild Card rerun of KC's struggles against Oakland makes 10 wins appear flimsy in comparison. If the Ravens fly into Kansas City and peck the Chiefs to death with little resistance, the idea that the 2010 Chiefs were a legitimate playoff team that's made significant progress in the last 16 months goes up in smoke.

In other words, the 2010 Chiefs would be frauds.

The perception that the Chiefs are just that goes beyond this column. Wednesday, former Redskins general manager Vinny Cerrato went on 95.7 The Fan in Baltimore and scoffed at the notion that the Chiefs could beat the Ravens.

"Kansas City I think is a fraud," Cerrato said. "You look at their schedule, you look at what Kansas City has played and they've played nobody. They've played two playoff teams. They lost at Indy and beat Seattle, if you count Seattle as a playoff team."

It’s not just Cerrato. Good luck finding many people outside of Kansas City who believe the Chiefs are on the same level as Baltimore. Inside The NFL hosts Cris Collinsworth and Warren Sapp both picked the Ravens to knock off Kansas City Wednesday night on Showtime. Phil Simms declined to pick a favorite because he’s calling the game.

And of course, the Chiefs are three-point underdogs in their own home stadium. They are perceived as pretenders, not contenders.

The only way to change that perception is for Pioli’s two-year talent crop to rise to the occasion.

Jason Whitlock's assault on Todd Haley's legitimacy as a head coach is irrelevant this weekend. It's Pioli's legitimacy as a general manager that's in question. The Ravens will reveal just how much progress he's made as the architect of the Kansas City Chiefs.

[Amnorix]

WTF?

Winning the division is progress. Massive progress. The Ravens are the 5 seed but should be 3. I guess every game is a measuring stick in a sense, but to say the 2010 Chiefs are frauds if you don't win against what ought to be the 3 seed? When the Ravens have a ton of playoff experience, including playoff-winning experience? When you're coming off like 6 wins over two years combined? That's totally reeruned.

[chiefzilla1501]

Originally Posted by Amnorix

WTF?

Winning the division is progress. Massive progress. The Ravens are the 5 seed but should be 3. I guess every game is a measuring stick in a sense, but to say the 2010 Chiefs are frauds if you don't win against what ought to be the 3 seed? When the Ravens have a ton of playoff experience, including playoff-winning experience? When you're coming off like 6 wins over two years combined? That's totally reeruned.

If Ed Reed is healthy all year long and if it doesn't take John Harbaugh/Cam Cameron a million ****ing games to realize that Willis McGahee is garbage and that Ray Rice is a star, they'd be even better, which is tough to imagine for an 11-5 team.

[Hammock Parties]

Originally Posted by Amnorix

WTF?

Winning the division is progress. Massive progress. The Ravens are the 5 seed but should be 3. I guess every game is a measuring stick in a sense, but to say the 2010 Chiefs are frauds if you don't win against what ought to be the 3 seed? When the Ravens have a ton of playoff experience, including playoff-winning experience? When you're coming off like 6 wins over two years combined? That's totally reeruned.

They don't need to win.

They need to prove they belong on the same field.

[The Bad Guy]

Making the playoffs is huge, just huge for team development.

The Chiefs are now a more attractive landing spot for free agents, players have bought into the message and you'll see continued improvement based on the people making the football decisions and the coaching.

[Bowser]

Originally Posted by The Bad Guy

Making the playoffs is huge, just huge for team development.

The Chiefs are now a more attractive landing spot for free agents, players have bought into the message and you'll see continued improvement based on the people making the football decisions and the coaching.

coughcoughfitzgeraldcough

[milkman]

Originally Posted by ClayWhit

They don't need to win.

They need to prove they belong on the same field.

In the context of your premise that these Chiefs are frauds, no they don't.

[chiefzilla1501]

Originally Posted by The Bad Guy

Making the playoffs is huge, just huge for team development.

The Chiefs are now a more attractive landing spot for free agents, players have bought into the message and you'll see continued improvement based on the people making the football decisions and the coaching.

That's an interesting point.

And judging by the look of Arrowhead, I imagine it will help sell the season tickets that will get rabid fans back in the seats. No better advantage for us than to bring Arrowhead back.

[ChiefGator]

Originally Posted by milkman

The fact that this team won games against bad teams, games that they didn't win in previous years, is progress.

I don't usually do this, but.... THIS.

We lost against bad teams over the last three years. Beating bad teams is in itself progress.

[Amnorix]

Originally Posted by ClayWhit

They don't need to win.

They need to prove they belong on the same field.

Honestly, they don't. 9-7 and out of the playoffs would've been very substantial progress.

You've got a young team with a first time playoff HC, first time playoff starting QB, and god-knows how many never-been-there-'afore players. You've got a handful of imported veterans to say "hey, by the way, the intensity REALLY GOES UP in the playoffs. Be READY!!" But until you live it, you can be down 21-zip and getting hammered before you know it.

The Patriots with many young players and a team that wasn't well in-synch got blown out at home during the playoffs by essentially this same Ravens team.

If you're saying "Frauds in terms of being a real, elite level playoff team" then I guess so, but to essentially argue no progress since 2 win and 4 win teams? It's far too late for that. They proved progress by going 10-6. Soft schedule, but it's the only one they had and they handled it better than the other AFCW teams.

All that said, I expect the Chiefs to get blown out, and I expect them to regress to 8-8 or so next year against a tougher sched but heighten their competitiveness after that, assuming solid drafting etc.

[jAZ]

Originally Posted by ClayWhit

They don't need to win.

They need to prove they belong on the same field.

They don't need to prove anything to you or anyone. If they want to show that they have taken a far bigger step forward in 1 year than anyone anywhere imagined, then they have to beat the Ravens.

But if they lose by 100 points on Sunday, they will still have done more than anyone thought would happen this year. They already proved themselves.

This is just stupid.

[BigRock]

HOLY SHIT.

What if they beat the Ravens, and then they go to Pittsburgh, and they get their asses handed to them by a team they BEAT last year?

That's not just "not making progress", that's MOVING BACKWARDS!

PIIIIIOOOOLLLLLLLIIIIIIII

[Bowser]

Originally Posted by BigRock

HOLY SHIT.

What if they beat the Ravens, and then they go to Pittsburgh, and they get their asses handed to them by a team they BEAT last year?

That's not just "not making progress", that's MOVING BACKWARDS!

PIIIIIOOOOLLLLLLLIIIIIIII

[Chris Meck]

I think anyone being honest would have to say that Kansas City is a young, ascending team.

They are maddeningly inconsistent-which is typical with young teams. This doesn't make them a fraud.

I don't expect that we will win Sunday; I hope so, but I think we're not quite there yet. I think we'll be better next year, and probably a real honest to god SB contender in January of '13. I expect we will climb into that rare franchise group that's in the hunt every year, like Pittsburgh, New England, Indianapolis, and Green Bay.

[jAZ]

What's with the Jet players not on this show?

[jAZ]

Nevermind. He just explained it (apparently for the first time). I guess i don't care.