The Chiefs beating the Vikings 22-17 wasn’t exactly pretty, but as cliché as it sounds, a win is a win is a win. This is what it looks like when the coaching staff has a plan of action, comes out with a sound philosophy and gets solid execution from their team. It may not look the best, but they come away with a win and they look confident and in control the entire game.
This is why the oft-heralded ‘Suck for Luck’ campaign doesn’t make sense. While nobody would deny that having Andrew Luck for the next 10-15 years would be a great thing for this organization, sacrificing an entire season to make it happen would not be. In this day and age where it’s becoming harder and harder to get and keep fans, the last thing this organization needs to do is erode their fan base with their fans reveling in the failure of the team. Such and attitude only breeds negative feelings toward this organization, which only makes the situation worse.
Fans remained at this game until the very last second and they were as loud as you would expect the Arrowhead Crowd to be. This needs to continue and ‘Suck for Luck’ only decreases the chances. As mentioned above, this game and this team wasn’t and is not perfect, but with this fan base behind them, they might be able to make something of this injury-riddled season.
With the victory there are always lots of good things to note. There definitely were some today, starting with:
Tamba Hali – Hali was a beast with 7 tackles and 2 sacks on the day. Throw in 5 QB hits and multiple pressures and McNabb wasn’t able to get comfortable with Hali terrorizing the backfield. Through the season to this point it seems Hali has proved his worth for the huge contract accumulating 4 sacks through 4 games. The best part being that Hali is becoming a more complete linebacker. Jared Allen continues to struggle to be a complete player, but on the other side it was nice to see Hali stay at home on two separate reverse plays and save them from being big time back breaking plays. Hali becoming more of a complete player only means one more step forward for this team.
Defensive Line – The Vikings may be having some offensive line woes of their own, but all the same, Adrian Peterson is still a premier rusher, if not the premier runner, and was held to only 3.5 yards per carry. Often times Peterson had nowhere to go once getting to the line of scrimmage and had to hesitate, allowing the defense to catch up to him. Despite the sate of the Vikings O-Line, it was comforting to see the D-Line stand up at the point of attack.
Dwayne Bowe and Steve – This is what we were promised with the signing of Steve Breaston. Combined these two had 9 receptions, 198 yards, and 1 TD. Bowe had a “classic Dwayne Bowe play” in which a slightly underthrown bomb from Cassel is caught and with a few broken tackles makes it in to the end zone for a long touchdown. Breaston made a big time 42 yard reception in the 3rd quarter to keep a drive alive and if the two continue to make big plays like this the passing game will only open up more and more.
Coaching scheme – On Nick Wrights show on Friday, Bill Maas came on the show and noted that the defense had changed up their scheme a slight amount starting with the Chargers game. While maintaining a base formation of a 3-4, the responsibilities of the front have 7 have been slightly tweaked so they are running a scheme closer to a 4-3 at times. With the majority of the Chiefs defensive players being brought up in the 4-3 scheme, this would play to their strengths a bit more. One thing’s for sure, whatever changes they have made, they need to continue to build on those to keep their defense playing as well as it has the last two weeks.
All that being said, the game wasn’t perfect and there were definitely some aspects that need to be cleaned up from this game:
Tight End coverage – It’s not clear why, but an Achilles heel as an organization has always been inability to cover a tight end. It’s why Shannon Sharpe is such a hated figure; it’s why players like Todd Heap and Heath Miller have destroyed this team time and time again. This defense is no different, Visanthe Shiancoe ate this team up all day long and was the biggest issue the defense had. This needs to be fixed if this team wants to win when they face great tight ends like Jermichael Finley and Rob Gronkowski.
Running game – As a team against the solid front seven of the Vikings the Chiefs were only able to muster 107 rushing yards and 3.7 yards per carry. They played well enough to overcome that this time, but in the future their running game has to be better to compete with better teams.
Matt Cassel – Despite some excellent throws and a decent stat line, Cassel has continued to prove he is slow to make a decision and is a single read quarterback. He needs to continue to improve at working through his reads if he wants to take the next step in this league.
Final Thoughts: The Chiefs have taken two teams with solid offenses in the last two weeks and held them in check. The Vikings may not seem like much, but going in to this game they had outscored their opponents 54-7 in the first half. The Chiefs were able to make sure that did not continue and that was what allowed them to win this game. If the coaches continue to ‘coach up’ these players and adjust the schemes to the personnel in the game, this team stands a chance for salvaging this season and Suck for Luck may end up being just a fleeting mindset.
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