Brian Waters reported to the first mandatory workout. Thank fucking god. I was really worried this was going to turn into another Jared Allen situation, accept with far less compensation. At least trading Allen gave us the flexibility to go BBA (Best Beast Available) at #5. Once Dorsey hit the field I was like, “Jared who?”. Trading Waters wouldn’t have landed us nearly as much, and it would’ve turned our offensive line into an instant disaster, much like trading Jared Allen turned our defensive line into an instant disaster. In my mind it was mandatory that Pioli and Haley make nice with Waters. Whether or not that happened (I’m guessing not), Waters is here, and he’s saying there is no problem. While that is most definitely untrue, at least he showed up. I’ll take that. Maybe Pioli and Haley’s hard-line stance will actually impose some much-needed discipline on these guys. God knows Herm didn’t. Regardless, Waters is here, and it appears he’ll be a Chief in 2009. That makes me happy.
What I become less happy about, almost on a daily basis, is the performance of perhaps the biggest BEAST* in our entire organization: Scott Pioli. The more I think about it, the more I dislike Pioli. I actually started to dislike him on a personal level pretty soon after he arrived, but that feeling was tempered by a belief that he’d be great at his job. I don’t know where this belief came from, I guess I just bought into the hype. Pioli could still be a good GM, but its foolish to assume that without actually looking at what he’s done in his first offseason. So thats what I want to do. This post will break down Scott Pioli’s first offseason with the Chiefs, placing special emphasis not on his actions themselves, but on his potential motivations for said actions. I believe assessing his motivations can tell us what kind of man he is and, more importantly, how he is likely to fare in the long run as GM of the Kansas City Chiefs.
*A BEAST doesn’t have to be an actual player. It can be anyone fans heap undeserved praise on. Ideally its a d-tackle, sure, but Scott Pioli certainly fits the bill.
It seems only right that we should begin with the facet of talent acquisition that was supposed to be Pioli’s forte: the draft. You already know how underwhelmed I was with our draft, and I’m guessing most of you feel the same. Given the extreme secrecy of the new front office*, we’ll likely never know exactly what went on in that war room. Although Pioli would obviously never admit this, I think its safe to say things didn’t go according to plan. The question is, what went wrong? And, more importantly, what can it tell us about our new GM? There are a few possibilities here:
*Whitlock wrote a great article about this the other day. Generally speaking I dislike the sports media and their constant whining and sense of entitlement. However, I think Pioli’s secrecy tactics are lame and deserving of ridicule.
1) The official version- Pioli, Haley, and the rest of our higher ups were so thrilled with the way the chips fell that they didn’t feel the need to aggressively pursue a trade. They got who they wanted when they wanted, and have no regrets. This is the explanation our front office would like us to believe, and maybe they’ve even managed to make themselves believe it. Regardless, it isn’t true. This draft may turn out to be a good one (I doubt it), but we weren’t nearly as aggressive or creative as we should have been. Standing pat and making boring picks was never the plan. Pioli’s “don’t go anywhere” comment is all the proof we need of that.
2) Other GMs don’t respect Pioli and they blackballed him- This is an interesting possibility, and a case can be made for it. After all, Pioli was part of the organization that got caught cheating, and there is no love lost between the rest of the league and Team Belichick. Pioli claimed “nobody was calling”. Either that was just a lame excuse for his failure to pull the trigger, or other GMs actually didn’t want to deal with him. The multitude of other trades, particularly the Sanchez trade, tell us there were definitely deals to be made. If we take Pioli’s excuse at face value, then there has to be a reason nobody was calling, right? For the record, I’m not taking it at face value. I’m just saying the excuse, if accurate, could potentially point to a much bigger problem. We’ve heard over and over how much respect everyone around the league has for Scott Pioli, but we’ve mainly heard that from the Chiefs. It seems to me every time any team hires a GM they can find a few quotes from around the league to make him look like a popular, respected figure. Put it this way: have you ever read an article about a recently hired GM that wasn’t replete with praise and adulation? If I have to choose between optimistic (but largely baseless) sentiments and actual evidence (the evidence this time being Pioli’s failure to make any draft-day moves), I’ll take the evidence every time.
Do I actually think Pioli was blackballed on draft-day? No. Do I think his failure to make any deals casts doubt on his supposedly fantastic reputation? Absolutely.
3) Scott Pioli is not a risk-taker- This is our huckleberry. If Pioli had the stones, he could’ve pulled something off. Acting like there just weren’t trades to be made is absurd, and taking Tyson Jackson with the third pick was settling. If we wanted Jackson, fine, but lets not pretend we needed to take him third. I think Pioli got scared and went into a shell. There’s no other explanation, really. We had several valuable trading chips (Dorsey, Waters, extra 2nd rounder next year) and a lot of needs to fill. My guess is Pioli had some negotiations going, couldn’t get exactly what he wanted, and decided in the end not to take the risk. Instead he went conservative, picked defensive linemen and acted like there were no other options. This is the draft-day equivalent of calling 3 straight running plays with a small lead late in the 4th quarter instead of risking a passing play to pick up the first down.
I realize it’s irresponsible to read too much into a single draft. However, its even more irresponsible to completely ignore it. A wise man (Porto) once told me you should judge a man by his actions. When it comes to the Chiefs, that isn’t done nearly enough. The matra “In Pioli we trust” is extremely popular in the Chiefs blogosphere. But my trust has to be earned, not freely given based on vague notions and blind faith. I ask you, what has Scott Pioli really done to earn our trust? If we actually judge him by his actions thus far, we see a conservative general manager not willing, or even interested, in taking dynamic action. Hey, maybe (hopefully) that description isn’t accurate. But if we look at Pioli’s first draft, that’s the only reasonable conclusion we can draw.
next week: Making the grade part 2, free agency
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I’m not sure how important Waters is, because it seems like we never hear about guards doing anything one way or the other. But Pioli and Haley do not seem to have handled hte situation very well.
I agree Pioli did not do much in the draft to increase optimism, but the draft is overrated and you can’t tell for several years anyway.
What Pioli has accomplished is the acquisition of a potential franchise quarterback. It is puzzling that he has not got him signed yet, but as of now, the acquisition has to be viewed as a significant plus.
By the way, I think he made a mistake in hiring Haley, or at least too big a risk. Selecting a young and inexperienced coach does not sound like a wise move.
I also think not a risk taker, at least in the circumstances presented, is the most likely answer. And it may be a good thing. If he made some moves just to make some moves, it would have been at least immature and possibly resulted in bad deals.
I still scratch my head over why they traded Gonzales.
back in the good old days, trading Tony G like that would be the kind of risk that could get a man strung up and hanged
paying a QB with one average (?) season under his belt like a pro-bowler would also be considered a rather hefty risk in a world where the sun still shined
the biggest risk, though, should be disrespecting the fans with this pompous silence.
i’d love to see a simple list of unanswered questions thus far. and what this front office has tried to pass off for answers to those questions. i’m guessing we’d be penciling “mum’s the word” and “don’t nobody go nowheres” in practically every time.
these people will have to be dealt with.
and we will have to do the dealing.
if only chiefschat could somehow hire boomboom as a man on the scene.
and phanatic
there’d be a new sheriff in town.sheriffs
Hilarious:
http://primebuzz.kcstar.com/?q=node/18944
Damn, I don’t know how to post photos to the blog