Posnanski: Draft a QB? Not if you're the Chiefs

KC hasn't drafted a quarterback in first round since 1983, making
Alex Smith just latest in long line of somebody else?s discarded quarterback

Pat Semansky / AP

When Alex Smith arrives in Kansas City, he'll simply be the latest in a long line of veteran QBs for K.C.

THE BIG READ

BY JOE POSNANSKI

updated 2:49 a.m. ET March 8, 2013

Thirty years ago, the Kansas City Chiefs were on the clock trying to determine their destiny as a football team. They were lousy ? and had been, on and off, for a decade. They had just fired their coach ? a likable World War II veteran with an English history degree from Harvard named Marv Levy. They had drawn fewer than 12,000 people to their last game in 1982. They desperately needed to win back a city that had given up on them.

The Chiefs had the seventh pick in the draft. They wanted a quarterback. This would become perhaps the most famous quarterback draft of them all. John Elway was the first pick. Dan Marino was on the board when the Chiefs drafted. Jim Kelly was on the board. But the Chiefs had something very specific in mind. They wanted a leader. They wanted a winner. They did not just want someone Kansas City could rally around ? they wanted someone to build an entire future around.

They took Todd Blackledge, a bright and driven quarterback who had led Penn State to the national title. And, no, it didn?t work out.

That was the moment it all changed. That was last time the Kansas City Chiefs went looking for a young quarterback to build the future around. For the next 30 years, the Kansas City Chiefs would build their future on quarterbacks on other teams.

* * *

There is no sure way to find a franchise quarterback. You could draft a quarterback with the first overall pick, if your team happens to be bad enough to get that first pick. That might be the most likely way to find a franchise quarterback. That?s how Pittsburgh acquired Terry Bradshaw, how Denver got Elway. You might get Eli Manning or Troy Aikman or Joe Namath that way. Then again, you might get David Carr or Tim Couch or JaMarcus Russell.

(The ideal way happened in Indianapolis where in 1998, with the first pick, the Colts took Peyton Manning. He dominated the game for more than a decade and led the Colts to annual playoff appearances and a Super Bowl title. When he got old, the Colts got the No. 1 pick again and took Andrew Luck, who looks like he might do similar things.)

You could try your luck later in the first round ? Marino and Kelly and Aaron Rodgers certainly turned out to be great picks. But those first-round picks could just as easily have turned out like Brady Quinn and Kyle Boller and J.P. Losman and David Klingler. Of the 119 first-round quarterbacks taken after the first pick, only about half started 50 NFL games, and only 39 percent played even in a single Pro Bowl.

You could draft a sleeper after the first round and develop him ? that?s how San Francisco got Joe Montana (3rd round), how New England got Tom Brady (6th round), how San Diego got Dan Fouts (3rd round), how Green Bay got Bart Starr (17th round!). But you should know, since 1950, more than half the quarterbacks taken second round or later (56.6 percent if you?re scoring at home) never started a single game in the NFL.

Well, yes, there?s another way. There?s the Kansas City Chiefs way. You could go and get somebody else?s discarded quarterback. You can get them when they?re young, the way Green Bay did when it got a raw Brett Favre from Atlanta. You can get them when they?re old, the way Oakland did when it scooped up a 32-year-old Jim Plunkett. You might con teams for them, the way New Orleans did with Drew Brees. You might give them a chance after they had been rejected, the way Baltimore did with John Unitas and St. Louis did with Kurt Warner.

These quarterbacks mentioned, of course, are the winning lottery tickets. The bet is that if you get someone else?s quarterback, you know more or less what you?re getting. You get a player with some experience, a player who has dealt with NFL adversity. You might get to skip some steps and plug that quarterback right into the starting lineup without enduring the young quarterback growing pains.

Of course, at the same time, you are almost always getting a quarterback that, for whatever reason, the other team really does not want.

The Kansas City Chiefs have been snapping up lottery tickets since that draft day debacle in 1983. They have not taken a single quarterback in the first round since the Blackledge miss. They have not taken a quarterback in the second round in more than 20 years. (Only the New Orleans Saints boast a similar streak of avoiding QBs high in the draft.) This year, they have the first pick in the NFL Draft ? and that?s the quarterback spot. Teams have taken a quarterback first overall in the each of the last four drafts (Indianapolis: Luck; Carolina: Cam Newton; St. Louis: Sam Bradford; Detroit: Matt Stafford) and in 12 of the last 15 drafts.

The Chiefs will not take a quarterback. This much is sure. It is widely believed they will take Texas A&M tackle Luke Joeckel, but even if they go in a different direction they won?t take a quarterback. We know this because the Chiefs just traded draft picks to San Francisco for Alex Smith, a one-time first overall pick who the 49ers moved to backup quarterback at the end of the year. This isn?t the first time Chiefs traded for a 49ers backup quarterback. It?s the fourth.

Yes, this is how the Chiefs have been doing business for many years. They hope this time it will work.

* * *

Last season, you might recall, there was a bit of controversy in Kansas City when some fans at Arrowhead Stadium cheered after quarterback Matt Cassel got hurt. Offensive tackle Eric Winston spoke out about it. There was much handwringing about how many fans actually cheered and whether they were really cheering his injury and whether Winston?s comments were fair. There?s no reason to revisit all of it.

But there is a larger point: Kansas City is hard on quarterbacks. This is true in every NFL city, but for some reason people don?t think of Kansas City this way. Many of the stories about the Cassel injury had some reference like ?Even genteel Kansas City? or ?Kansas City, a place known for its friendliness.? Well, Kansas City can be genteel, and it?s certainly friendly. It?s a wonderful place. But it eats up quarterbacks.

Focus On Sport / Getty Images Len Dawson is in the Pro Football Hall of Fame, but that makes him a rarity among Chiefs quarterbacks.

I can?t tell you how many times Hall of Fame Len Dawson, the city?s greatest quarterback and a television personality in town since his playing days, told me stories about the boos he heard when he was playing. He says he did not mind (?Part of the deal,? he says) and I believe him ? Lenny the Cool had that ability to separate himself from it all.

But it takes that sort of thick skin to survive, and not many people have that. Steve Bono once made a little joke about how the worst restaurant in San Francisco tops the best restaurant in Kansas City, and then he expanded on that joke by making specific cracks about Kansas City restaurant owners. He followed this up with a woeful 68.0 quarterback rating in 1996 and he was so mercilessly despised in town that, at the end, he semi-broke down during a tear-stricken newspaper interview.

Another Chiefs quarterback, Elvis Grbac, reached a Pro Bowl, but after one tough loss he talked about a dropped pass by saying,? I can?t throw the ball and catch it too.? This became a catch phrase in Kansas City, not in a good way, and he left for Baltimore right after his Pro Bowl year. One year later, he was out of football.

There are a lot of stories like that. Kansas City is no different from other cities where pro football is the unifying presence ? the quarterback is under more intense scrutiny than the mayor or the school superintendent or just about anybody else. Ron Jaworski will tell you Philadelphia was a tough place to play, but Kansas City was plenty tough too.

The Chiefs made a conscious decision, after watching Todd Blackledge falter (he started 29 games, completed 48 percent of his passes and posted a 60.1 quarterback rating) to keep bringing in veteran quarterbacks. As one former Chiefs executive told me: ?Kansas City has this reputation as a great place, and it is a great place. But we always knew: it would be a tough place for a young quarterback to grow up.?

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Draft a QB? Not if you're KC

The Big Read by Joe Posnanski: The Chiefs haven't?went looking for a young quarterback to build the future around since?1983. Will that change this year?

Source: http://nbcsports.msnbc.com/id/51088884/ns/sports-nfl/

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