Tribal Warfare
08-27-2008, 05:34 PM
http://www.bobgretz.com/chiefs-football/the-feely-affair.html
The Feely Affair
August 27, 2008 - Bob Gretz |
So just what were the Chiefs doing with Jay Feely this week?
They brought Feely to Kansas City on Sunday where he made eight of 12 kicks in a workout for the coaches and personnel staffs.
They signed the veteran kicker on Monday and in competition with Nick Novak and Connor Barth, he went out and hit 11 of 15 field goal tries.
There was another kickoff between the three on Tuesday and Feely made 13 of 15 attempts.
Then they released him, just over 24 hours after signing him.
What’s up?
It’s another case of the Chiefs sticking to their plan right now of building through young players and not reaching into free agency every time they’ve got a problem. Sometimes however, the old urges pop up, especially so at the kicking position where any coach would have a 70-year old kicker if he was good inside the 40-yard line and could nail kickoffs.
So they brought Feely in for what was an extended workout. To make that happen, they had to add him to the active roster. He was told this from the start that no roster spot was guaranteed. He was told he was coming into kick for a job.
Now, the fairness of that type of competition can be debated, given the fact he’s been out of work for the last two weeks. Plus, he was faced with all new conditions and a new holder. But remember, the kicking competition was simply kicking. There was no crowd, there were no weather conditions, there wasn’t a rush from an opponent. If he had not been kicking over the weeks since he was released by the Dolphins, then that was his mistake of falling out of shape.
In this extended tryout, Feely made 76.2 percent of his field goal attempts. He was easily third in the fight behind Barth and Novak and thus was out of a roster spot.
This wasn’t about money: the Chiefs have plenty of room under the cap and Feely would not be at the top of the NFL pay scale for kickers. This was about approach.
“If it’s a good veteran and we feel he fits in our system and does what we want him to do, that’s fine,” Edwards said when asked about Feely’s departure. “But you just don’t go out and get a veteran just to say we got a veteran. We did that a little bit last year and it didn’t turn out too well at certain positions. We’re going in another direction.”
He would be speaking of spending money in free agency last year on Damion McIntosh, Napoleon Harris and Donnie Edwards. None of those players had very good seasons last year and there’s a good chance none will be with the team next season.
It also came down to something Edwards has been saying since the end of last year.
“When you say you’re going to have competition is it really competition or are you just saying that?” Edwards said. “To me, when you tell your football team that this thing is all about competition at all positions and then all of a sudden you do otherwise, players know what’s gone on here. You can’t say that’s competition. I’m trying to be fair.
“At the end, these guys (Novak and Barth) have been 85 or 86% charting all the kicks every day. Now, they’ve missed one in the game. If you can get a kicker to kick 80% in the season you take that. Right now they are.”
But Feely has kicked in the league; that was the entire reason he was brought in for a look. Shouldn’t that give him more than a three-day look?
“You weigh all those things, but at the end you have to look where you want to go,” Edwards said. “We didn’t just look at the numbers but the whole package. If you look at him he’s a veteran guy who has been a good kicker in this league. All those things are in his favor. With the other guys, one is a rookie and one has kicked in some games. They don’t have this guy’s pedigree. But that doesn’t mean they can’t kick.
“We did it in a manner we were comfortable doing. It was honest. When you’re in our situation and you’re a young football team I think the easy thing to do is when guys are in a position where there isn’t a favorite you go get a veteran. We’re not doing that. We’re trying to develop a football team; we’re trying to build a football team.”
The Feely Affair
August 27, 2008 - Bob Gretz |
So just what were the Chiefs doing with Jay Feely this week?
They brought Feely to Kansas City on Sunday where he made eight of 12 kicks in a workout for the coaches and personnel staffs.
They signed the veteran kicker on Monday and in competition with Nick Novak and Connor Barth, he went out and hit 11 of 15 field goal tries.
There was another kickoff between the three on Tuesday and Feely made 13 of 15 attempts.
Then they released him, just over 24 hours after signing him.
What’s up?
It’s another case of the Chiefs sticking to their plan right now of building through young players and not reaching into free agency every time they’ve got a problem. Sometimes however, the old urges pop up, especially so at the kicking position where any coach would have a 70-year old kicker if he was good inside the 40-yard line and could nail kickoffs.
So they brought Feely in for what was an extended workout. To make that happen, they had to add him to the active roster. He was told this from the start that no roster spot was guaranteed. He was told he was coming into kick for a job.
Now, the fairness of that type of competition can be debated, given the fact he’s been out of work for the last two weeks. Plus, he was faced with all new conditions and a new holder. But remember, the kicking competition was simply kicking. There was no crowd, there were no weather conditions, there wasn’t a rush from an opponent. If he had not been kicking over the weeks since he was released by the Dolphins, then that was his mistake of falling out of shape.
In this extended tryout, Feely made 76.2 percent of his field goal attempts. He was easily third in the fight behind Barth and Novak and thus was out of a roster spot.
This wasn’t about money: the Chiefs have plenty of room under the cap and Feely would not be at the top of the NFL pay scale for kickers. This was about approach.
“If it’s a good veteran and we feel he fits in our system and does what we want him to do, that’s fine,” Edwards said when asked about Feely’s departure. “But you just don’t go out and get a veteran just to say we got a veteran. We did that a little bit last year and it didn’t turn out too well at certain positions. We’re going in another direction.”
He would be speaking of spending money in free agency last year on Damion McIntosh, Napoleon Harris and Donnie Edwards. None of those players had very good seasons last year and there’s a good chance none will be with the team next season.
It also came down to something Edwards has been saying since the end of last year.
“When you say you’re going to have competition is it really competition or are you just saying that?” Edwards said. “To me, when you tell your football team that this thing is all about competition at all positions and then all of a sudden you do otherwise, players know what’s gone on here. You can’t say that’s competition. I’m trying to be fair.
“At the end, these guys (Novak and Barth) have been 85 or 86% charting all the kicks every day. Now, they’ve missed one in the game. If you can get a kicker to kick 80% in the season you take that. Right now they are.”
But Feely has kicked in the league; that was the entire reason he was brought in for a look. Shouldn’t that give him more than a three-day look?
“You weigh all those things, but at the end you have to look where you want to go,” Edwards said. “We didn’t just look at the numbers but the whole package. If you look at him he’s a veteran guy who has been a good kicker in this league. All those things are in his favor. With the other guys, one is a rookie and one has kicked in some games. They don’t have this guy’s pedigree. But that doesn’t mean they can’t kick.
“We did it in a manner we were comfortable doing. It was honest. When you’re in our situation and you’re a young football team I think the easy thing to do is when guys are in a position where there isn’t a favorite you go get a veteran. We’re not doing that. We’re trying to develop a football team; we’re trying to build a football team.”