Sam Mellinger | Hold your nose when Chiefs play

[Tribal Warfare]

Sam Mellinger | Hold your nose when Chiefs play
By SAM MELLINGER
The Kansas City Star
Keep in mind the Chargers stink too, guys. Their quarterback turns it over too much, their roster is declining and their coach will probably soon be fired. But the Chargers’ is a more conventional brand of stink.

The NFL smells the Chargers’ kind of stink all the time, and it’s a significant stink. But by now we all know there is no stink like the Chiefs’ brand of stink. We’re part of history here, you know: An up-close look at the kind of relentless, tenacious, opening-kickoff-to-final-whistle, never-take-a-snap-off stink against which all future generations of terrible teams will be judged.

This fireable offense of a Chiefs season made its prime-time debut, every misstep and fumble and failure of a 31-13 loss here to the (not as) sorry Chargers broadcast in high-definition to what we can only assume was a bored national audience.

The only drama left is whether the Chiefs will ever hold a lead while they take a snap this season, and when owner Clark Hunt will break his silence to fire the coach who’s overmatched and the general manager who obsesses over everything but quarterbacks.

Sickening and disgusting. The Chiefs are clearly not gladiators.

You surely know the incredible fact that has come to define this group of underachieving, badly coached, and micromanaged losers: They haven’t held a lead in any part of their first eight games, the first team to be so thoroughly overmatched since 1929.

That’s nineteen-twenty-nine — the year of the (original) stock market crash. To give you an idea, in 1929, the NFL included teams in Frankford, Pa.; Staten Island, N.Y.; and Dayton, Ohio.

This is such an achievement of incompetence that it is at once both stunning and unfathomable. Even the 0-16 Lions of 2008 managed a few leads. Actually, by this point in their season, the Lions had led in four games — three in the fourth quarter.

To do what the Chiefs are doing requires a conspiracy of unpreparedness, ineffectiveness and whatever is the complete opposite of surgical focus — stoner focus, maybe.

You have to do things like be outscored 61-6 in the first quarter — a pretty good sign the coaches are in over their heads — while still being able to channel your substantial failures at just the wrong times.

You need a quarterback like Matt Cassel, in other words, who can fumble the snap at the goal line with your team threatening to take a lead against the Ravens. You need punt returners like Javier Arenas, too, who can whiff an easy catch at just the right time to throw momentum over to the other side against the Raiders.

And it’s fine to have a talented receiver like Dwayne Bowe, but only if the bulk of his production comes on garbage drives at the ends of blowouts — extra credit if he makes a fool of himself by pointing to the name on the back of his jersey — and you can count on him to fumble near the red zone when the score is close against the Chargers.

You need one quarterback who has as many or more turnovers than all but one NFL team (not including his own), but also a backup who’s probably worse.

You need a team in such disarray that a team captain with a $60 million contract is benched, the star running back gets 39 touches in one game and five carries in another, the head coach openly and repeatedly says he doesn’t know what’s going on, and the owner stays silent behind the scenes trying to decide when to step in.

You a team that’s become such a punch line in some football circles that the coach who got fired last year is jokingly called “Vince Lombardi with a dirty cap” by one personnel man while comparing the current carnage.

Kansas City sports fans have taken some misguided criticism this fall, but maybe now the football world can see what drives people to fly banners over the stadium calling for the general manager to be fired.

That’s looking more and more likely, by the way. Hunt doesn’t want to fire Scott Pioli, but he doesn’t like to be embarrassed either. The Chiefs are now nine days from what looks to be an ugly Monday night loss in Pittsburgh as Todd Haley’s Steelers offense presumably takes aim at scoring a thousand points.

The Chiefs, with a level of thorough, consistent, no-snaps-off stink the league has never seen, can no longer be talked about in a serious manner. Not until Hunt takes serious action, anyway.

Maybe the next coach can call a play with the lead.

[ArrowheadMagic]

Something tells me, Haley isnt taking a knee on Monday Night.

[Pushead2]

I hope the Steelers win 63-13

[BigMeatballDave]

Originally Posted by Saleenman607

trust in the owner and GM.......they have a plan and fans must be patient.

I hope you're joking.

[007]

you thought it was exciting to see Carl step down. This is going to be a party of epic proportions if Pioli is fired.

[kcxiv]

Damn, we hear great quotes from Romeo's presser week in and week out. i havent heard shit this time. Im going to have to go searching on the KC Chiefs website to hear his presser

[kcxiv]

wow, its so bad they cut everything out and gave him about a minute on the KC Chiefs website. usually you get full pressers. lol

[Tribal Warfare]

Originally Posted by Guru

you thought it was exciting to see Carl step down. This is going to be a party of epic proportions if Pioli is fired.

cars may be tipped and people might be killed

[kcxiv]

Originally Posted by listopencil

Perhaps he just rattled off a disgusted rant and they went with it?

i know him and Kent Babb are always talking on twitter how they edit some of their words. Mellinger was like one day Suck is gonna make it passed the editors. lol

I think the editors move alot of the words around because its pretty harsh on the team right now.

[keg in kc]

I didn't hold my nose, but I did catch up with a bunch of stuff on my DVR.

[bowener]

If I were mega rich, I'd publicly pledge to donate $1 million to cancer ridden children the second Pioli is fired. Clark would still refuse.

[Bob Dole]

Didn't the Chargers defense score as many TDs in 2:06 as our offense has in the past 240:00?

[soopamanluva]

Originally Posted by bowener

If I were mega rich, I'd publicly pledge to donate $1 million to cancer ridden children the second Pioli is fired. Clark would still refuse.

If I was super wealthy, id try to buy the damn team...

[BlackHelicopters]

They don't make water hot enough to wash away the filth that is this "team."

[Sweet Daddy Hate]

Piloi's FAIL gives me such warm fuzzies...

[htismaqe]

Originally Posted by Bob Dole

Didn't the Chargers defense score as many TDs in 2:06 as our offense has in the past 240:00?