Chiefs Return to Reality on Field, Remain Detached From It Otherwise

When the Chiefs knocked off the Broncos at home a week ago, more than one Chiefs fan probably hoped that the win would jumpstart the rebuilding process and provide a blueprint to a respectable 2008 season. That was wishful thinking. The Chiefs showed little fight against the Panthers in a 34-0 rout yesterday.

Joe Posnanski of the Kansas City Star reports, that may be because the Chiefs didn't seem too fazed by the whole ordeal.

And yet the Chiefs' locker room had a surprising and disconcerting chipperness after the game. I'm not saying anyone was happy, because it wasn't that. And I'm not saying that after games like this football players and coaches should lock themselves in stockades and allow quarterbacks with accuracy to throw tomatoes at them. But, from coach Herman Edwards on down, the Chiefs seemed three connecting flights away from reality.

Talk of learning experiences and growing pains are great for making it seem like you are making progress. Yesterday was a major regression, though, and, no matter how little talent is in the building, it should make your team upset.

Making it all the stranger is Edwards' presence at the helm. The coach who famously made "you play to win the game" part of the NFL lexicon presiding over a sanguine post-loss locker room makes for a difficult image to conjure. One wonders if he might not be thinking about how much easier it would be to talk about games like this on TV than live them in person.