ChiefsPlanet - Flanagan: Chiefs need to draft better before starting over

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Chiefs need to draft better before they can start over

JEFFREY FLANAGAN

With the Chiefs at 1-4, some Chiefs fans already may be looking ahead, as in starting over, as in rebuilding the team through the draft.

That thinking makes some sense, especially when you look at an aging offensive line, aging wide receivers, a 34-year-old quarterback, etc.

But ironically, the Chiefs' inability to draft well is perhaps one of the reasons they haven't won a playoff game in more than 10 years. It's also one of the reasons the Chiefs simply can't, like the Royals, shift to playing a lot of young prospects the rest of the season. There really aren't any.

Since the Chiefs last won a playoff game, they have had 10 drafts. Name the truly impact players they have selected in those drafts.

You can probably come up with three: Tony Gonzalez, Dante Hall and Jerome Woods. They've all made the Pro Bowl (actually, so did Gary Stills last year as a special teams player). But that's not exactly a lot of big-time production from the draft.

There have also been some amazing whiffs with high-round picks: Trezelle Jenkins, Greg Hill, Mike Cloud (2) , Sylvester Morris, Eddie Freeman (2) and Larry Johnson, to name a few.

The Chiefs will argue that they have drafted near the bottom of the first round for many of those years, putting them at a great disadvantage. But also picking near the bottom of the first round have been the Broncos, who lead the division at 5-1 and have won two Super Bowls during the last 10 years.

The Broncos have plucked many stars out of the draft, such as Terrell Davis, Clinton Portis, Al Wilson, Trevor Pryce, and Tom Nalen. They've selected other difference-makers such as Deltha O'Neal and Mike Anderson and Olandis Gary and John Mobley and Ben Hamilton and Ashey Lelie. Their scouting department also discovered undrafted stars such as Rod Smith.

The point being this: If the Chiefs hope to catch up with the Broncos some day they better hope their 2004 draft (Junior Siavii, Kris Wilson, Keyaron Fox, Samie Parker, Jared Allen) pans out and marks the beginning of a new and more effective youth movement.

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A couple of observations from the weekend of sports:

• Can someone explain why Bill Snyder elected to punt with his team trailing 31-21 and just less than a minute remaining on Saturday? What was the point of that? Granted, it would have taken a small miracle for K-State to rally — a freak touchdown pass, an onside kick, etc.

But isn't the point of the game to keep trying until the very end?

It's not as if Oklahoma would have run up the score (the Sooners simply went to a knee after the punt). If Snyder was throwing up the white flag, he may just as well have told his team to head to the locker room at that point.

• ESPN needs a strategy adjustment on its “Sunday Night Football” package as well. Sideline reporter Suzy Kolber used to provide some fairly useful information, but this season she has been reduced to doing these silly in-game recaps that come at us every five minutes or so.

These recaps are tiresomely redundant (and obviously the product of some ridiculous market-research study). Kolber also forces so much enthusiasm into them that she virtually hyperventilates. Suggestion: Ease it down, ESPN. Let the game breathe a little.

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From columnist Mike Freeman of The Florida Times-Union: “We know what the Chiefs are. They are patsies. They are the equivalent of Middle Tennessee State, de-evolving in just a few (months) from a great high-wire act into a last-place team. No wonder Dick Vermeil cries so much. If you had to coach that every week, you'd weep, too.”

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Good news perhaps for Royals fans: White Sox star outfielder Magglio Ordonez has switched agents and has picked up Scott Boras, which has White Sox fans (not to mention White Sox officials) worried that Ordonez will wind up in either New York or Los Angeles or Boston.

The White Sox, like the Royals, have pretty much tried to avoid Boras clients over the last five years, knowing full well that Boras isn't likely to take any budget-conscious team seriously in negotiations.

Ordonez is a free agent, by the way.