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09-23-2009, 01:01 AM | |
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Babb: Chiefs’ Cassel can’t count on starting if he doesn’t produce
Chiefs’ Cassel can’t count on starting if he doesn’t produce
By KENT BABB The Kansas City Star Chiefs coach Todd Haley liked some of what Matt Cassel did on Sunday, but there wasn’t enough of it for Haley to say that Cassel will be Kansas City’s starting quarterback for the rest of the season and beyond. Haley said that, like all other positions, the quarterback job will remain available to the most proficient player — regardless of salary, name or background. “You’ve got to ultimately do what gives your team the best chance to win,” Haley said Tuesday. “If that means another quarterback being in there other than Matt Cassel, then sign me up.” Cassel played every snap for the Chiefs in Sunday’s 13-10 loss to Oakland. It was his first game back in the lineup after spraining his left knee in Kansas City’s third preseason game, and Haley said last week that he expected Cassel to show some rust. Cassel completed 24 of 39 passes for 241 yards. He also threw two interceptions and was sacked twice. Haley said he was encouraged by Cassel’s performance, including the fearless way the quarterback scrambled out of trouble and rushed for 34 yards despite that bad knee. “I like a lot about this guy,” Haley said. But there are things that Haley said he likes about backup quarterback Brodie Croyle, too. Haley said that he wants to see both players improve each week and keep the competition between them at more than a simmer. Haley again praised Croyle’s poise in a loss in the regular-season opener at Baltimore, saying that the fourth-year quarterback gave the Chiefs a chance to upset the Ravens by playing a mostly mistake-free contest. Haley said Tuesday that he doesn’t want any player getting too comfortable. That has been a common theme since the team gathered in July for training camp in River Falls, Wis., and Haley has said often that just because a player starts one day, he won’t necessarily start the next. Haley has shaken up every other position group, sometimes to deliver messages to perceived starters and other times to get a look at an underused player. He said that was the reason running back Jamaal Charles and tight end Brad Cottam were inactive last Sunday: so the Chiefs could observe running back Dantrell Savage and rookie tight end Jake O’Connell without weakening other positions. But as Haley tinkered with other positions, the one he left alone was quarterback. Haley didn’t announce Cassel as the starter until late in the preseason, but it was Cassel who took the first-team snaps in training camp and preseason games — and it was Cassel who shouldered the starting quarterback’s other responsibilities, such as a weekly meeting with reporters. It didn’t seem to hurt Cassel’s chances that he signed a long-term contract extension with the Chiefs and that he’ll make a guaranteed $28 million over the deal’s duration. If Cassel was the one player with bulletproof job security, Haley delivered a message Tuesday that he’ll have to do like everyone else — work hard, be good and play smart — to keep his job. “It’s a process of trying to get it right,” Haley said. “I just know this from the teams that I’ve been around and the ones I’ve paid attention to.” He has watched other coaches make the unpopular decision of benching other communities’ preferred quarterbacks. While Haley was with the New York Jets, he watched coach Bill Parcells bench quarterback Glenn Foley, a local favorite, in favor of veteran Vinny Testaverde. The Jets won 12 games that year. Nearly a decade later, when Parcells brought Haley to Dallas, the young assistant again watched Parcells bench a popular quarterback, Drew Bledsoe, for an upstart named Tony Romo after Bledsoe started the 2006 season with three losses in six games. Romo led the Cowboys to the playoffs. Then last year, while Haley was Arizona’s offensive coordinator, coaches chose veteran Kurt Warner as the starting quarterback despite the fact that Matt Leinart was a former first-round pick with a fat contract. Warner led the Cardinals to the Super Bowl. “If we don’t go with what our gut tells us at that position,” Haley said, “we wouldn’t have been where we were.” Haley said Tuesday that, in each of those cases, the head coach had to make a decision based only on instinct and in observing each quarterback’s sharpness — and ignore factors such as contract details and outside criticism. “When we made that change,” Haley said, “there was a lot of negative feedback and, ‘What are you doing?’ and, ‘What about the future?’ There weren’t too many people saying much when we were in the Super Bowl.” Haley wasn’t saying Tuesday that the Chiefs might finish this season in the Super Bowl — or even the playoffs. And he wasn’t saying that Cassel won’t finish this season as the Chiefs’ starter, either. He was saying that Cassel had better be on point — or, like so many other positions, Kansas City will turn toward someone who is. “Our whole goal is to get competition at as many positions as we can, quarterback being one of those,” Haley said. “When there’s somebody pushing you, you have a better chance of being at your best. When you can’t handle that pressure, you’ll probably go by the wayside, and that becomes clear to everybody.” |
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09-23-2009, 01:06 PM | #31 | |
Cry havoc...
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Quote:
Also to say he went against the "core beliefs of the Patriots organization" is laughable. They've acquired guys who love football and are about winning. Specific to your points: 1) Who ever said it's against their philosophy to draft a QB high? The Pats already had Drew Bledsoe and then Brady emerged, so when was there ever a need to draft a QB high? Atlanta meanwhile was a totally different animal, you just had your franchise QB going to jail and fan apathy was abound. Matt Ryan was the perfect "Patriots type" player, a guy who was all about football and all about improving. And Arthur Blank was pushing for the QB to be picked because they needed a new face to the franchise. So that's where they went. 2) The Pats have never been shy about free agency. They have been smart about it. And you could say that about Atlanta too. They didn't overpay, they went out and got the right guys for that team. 3) Traded for Randy Moss and Wes Welker. So where's the difference? If you have an opportunity to get a few playmakers who can make the difference on your team, you get them, and both organizations did. This whole thing about Dimitrioff abandoning anything that had to do with the Patriots is just a fallacy. Just because Mike Smith isn't a Bellichick clone doesn't mean he didn't implement the same values in the organization, which as the article points out, he did (and mentioned the Patriots influence several times throughout it)... |
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09-23-2009, 01:06 PM | #32 |
Woman should only make babies
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they got to put a moat around castle
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09-23-2009, 06:47 PM | #33 |
special teams
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I think it maybe a scare tactic
just to let cassell know he isn't the chosen one
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Psyko Tek The keyboard has been drinking, |
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09-23-2009, 07:18 PM | #34 | |
Dumbass!
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Quote:
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09-23-2009, 07:25 PM | #35 |
Hockey Town
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Dimitroff did everything completely differently than all of the other guys have...
He didn't shoehorn his team into a 3-4, he used his first 2 picks on a QB and a LT, if you look at how he did things compared to the rest of the Patriot disciples it's night and day. Just look at the coach he hired. |
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09-23-2009, 07:25 PM | #36 |
Shit
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09-23-2009, 07:30 PM | #37 | ||||
I'll be back.
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Quote:
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09-23-2009, 07:32 PM | #38 |
Shit
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is that last one actually what you said dane? wow lol
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09-23-2009, 07:39 PM | #39 | |
I'll be back.
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Dane has always had good strong man love for Thiggy.
Quote:
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09-23-2009, 07:39 PM | #40 |
sorta mod-ish
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This is an impressive amount of hand wringing over a guy that has had one ****ing start with a new team.
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09-23-2009, 07:44 PM | #41 |
Dumbass!
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Gotta admire a man with his conviction.
But, boy, when he flips, he flops.
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09-23-2009, 07:45 PM | #42 |
Dumbass!
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The fact is, we all have said some things that we believed at times only to figure out eventually that we were wrong.
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09-23-2009, 07:46 PM | #43 |
In Search of a Life
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09-23-2009, 07:46 PM | #44 |
I'll be back.
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Click the little red buttons next to Dane's name in the posts I quoted.
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09-23-2009, 07:46 PM | #45 |
Say hello to my little friend
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The guy who started the Hermines is the last guy who should go dumpster diving.
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