Hope still on Chiefs’ sideline
Edwards, Peterson haven’t ruled out playoffs for team, which has lost two straight.
By ELIZABETH MERRILL
The Kansas City Star
It was one of those cloudy, gloomy mornings when even the elevator music lost its pep.
On one end of the room, Carl Peterson’s eyes were tired as he spoke of the failing health of owner Lamar Hunt. On the other, Chiefs coach Herm Edwards quietly made his way upstairs to try salvaging a 7-6 season gone wrong.
Times like these, a team needs to be together. And on Friday afternoon, the Chiefs will board a plane, some 48 hours before they play San Diego in prime time, and spend two nights on an extended road trip.
Edwards did it this way in New York, because he wanted his team to get acclimated to the West Coast. His Jets went 7-1 on the road that first season in 2001.
Fresh legs are good, but the Chiefs may just need a change of scenery. They’ve gone from 7-4 and surging to a two-game skid and sliding out of playoff contention. OK, make that almost out of the playoffs.
“This organization has not lost hope that we can still qualify for the playoffs,” Peterson said. “We’ve got three very important games. If we are successful in all three, you figure out what the odds are then.
“I will always maintain hope until we’re mathematically eliminated, and we are not there yet.”
But the oddsmakers would calculate a Kansas City win Sunday as a decent-sized upset. The Chargers are favored by more than a touchdown, they’re considered the best team in the NFL, and Kansas City has gone from functioning to dysfunctional on the road.
The most alarming behavior happened two weeks ago at Cleveland. The Chiefs were up by 14 with 9 minutes to play when the bottom-feeder Browns staged a massive rally and won in overtime. Edwards’ team is 2-4 on the road, and that undoubtedly frustrates the man who used to love packing a bag in his days of Gang Green.
“I don’t know … I like going on the road and playing,” Edwards said. “I really do. I mean, I’ve always been that way as a player and a coach. I just think you come together as a team. That’s how you have to play if you’re going to win on the road. And once you get that feeling of doing that, you’re going to win on the road.
“I know in my first year as a coach, we couldn’t wait to get on the road and we won a lot of football games. That’s what we’ve got to start doing. We’ve got to start winning games on the road, especially this month. We’ve got to win games, period.”
After most losses, Edwards is usually animated in his weekly sit-down with reporters. On Tuesday, he was rather subdued and spoke of his team’s limited options matter-of-factly.
He acknowledged that the Chiefs have lost some road games they shouldn’t have in Cleveland and Miami. He knows another loss almost certainly puts them out of the playoff picture.
Asked how he gets the Chiefs to believe they’re not in a hopeless situation, Edwards said, “They’ll be fine.”
He repeated himself.
“They’ll be fine.”
There are a lot of things for Edwards and Peterson to worry about in this last month of the season, on and off the field. Seven-time Pro Bowl tight end Tony Gonzalez still doesn’t have a new contract, and the town is edgy that their lifelong Chief will hit the market and high-tail it to a team that can give him a Super Bowl ring.
Peterson said Tuesday that they won’t lose Gonzalez.
And then there’s the inconsistency of the defense and the turnovers from the offense and the fact that in the last 10 years, the franchise has been to the postseason just twice.
Edwards couldn’t let all that consume his thoughts Tuesday. All he could do was think about bringing his team together on the road.
“I think it’s good for us,” Edwards said. “Everything we’re going through right now is good for this program, because it’s the foundation you want to set.
“We’re going to play the team that won the division outright. There are still some things we can accomplish, too, and I think we can’t lose sight of that when you’re trying to build a program. You never lose sight of the big picture, and that’s what this is all about. How we start the season off, how we’re going to end the season, how we’re going to grow.”
