Road not friendly to Chiefs in December
By Tully Corcoran
The Capital-Journal
The question is this: How do you fix something when you don't really know what the problem is?
Why is one team darn near unbeatable at home and downright awful on the road? And why is it only this way one month out of the season?
How, in the last five Decembers, could the Chiefs go 13-0 at Arrowhead and 3-9 away from Kansas City?
"I wasn't here," Chiefs coach Herm Edwards said. "I have no idea."
Neither does anybody else.
All Edwards can do is emphasize it and hope something changes.
"He's like, 'Listen, this is what a lot of you guys have done in the last few years on the road in this type of situation so we have to find different ways to make it better,' " quarterack Trent Green said. "Different routines, whether that means traveling differently, running the meeting differently, the amount of free time, the amount of meeting time, the way things are coordinated on the road, all of those things he's tried to make adjustments and only time will tell."
Edwards' first opportunity to swing the trend further in Kansas City's favor is Sunday at Cleveland, where Kansas City is 2-6-1 all-time. He doesn't know what exactly he should change.
His only recourse is to go with the road map he's followed his whole coaching career.
"You've got to get off to a fast start and play with a lead on the road," he said. "If you don't do that it becomes very, very difficult on the road and all road games are tough no matter who you play."
And several of the December road losses have been utter beatdowns.
The Chiefs gave up 445 yards to Dallas in a relatively tame 31-28 loss in Big D last year, then went to New York and, in trying to tackle Giants running back Tiki Barber, looked like kids trying to hoist a greased watermelon out of a swimming pool.
Before winning both December roadies in 2004, the Chiefs had two of their three 2003 losses in December, on the road. There was the 45-27 demolition in Denver and the 45-20 dismantling in Minnesota.
In December road games at Dallas and at the New York Giants last year, Kansas City trailed at halftime both times and lost both games.
These struggles have come at the end of otherwise promising seasons. The 2003 team, the last one to make the playoffs, won the AFC West at 13-3 and earned a home playoff game. Last year, the Chiefs went 10-6 and missed the playoffs because they couldn't beat a pair of NFC teams on the road.
"The same guys go, we don't rent our helmets out," Edwards said. "The same coaches go, we all go and we have to find ways to play better. I think there are some things that we can do better."
The Chiefs find themselves in the same position they were a year ago.
"We had the same record at 7-4 and we lost the two games on the road and won the three at home and we missed the playoffs," Green said. "Because we have three of the remaining five games on the road, we have to correct that."
