Reflections From the Road … Morning Cup O’Chiefs

From America’s Highways and Byways

Here’s hope that the weekend plus-one was a useful time for all and everyone took time to honor those who have helped make this the greatest country in the world.

As a road warrior for the better part of the last week, it’s interesting watching the gas prices along our wonderful interstate network of highways. In our travels the price of gas was between $3.53 to $3.97, with the average somewhere between $3.75 and $3.79 per gallon.

It’s remarkable how the same product can have such a range of prices within a rather small geographical area. A lot of the differences come from taxes, but that doesn’t explain a difference of 44 centers per gallon, or as much of a $9 difference for a full tank of gas.

A suggestion – if you are heading east and will cross into Illinois make sure you fill up before you hit the Land of Lincoln. The difference in price from St. Louis on the west side of the Mississippi River to the east side and Illinois was 25 cents per gallon. The further into Illinois, the higher the prices; the folks in Chicago are still paying $4 a gallon and the prices have come down lately.

Loading up the family truckster is no longer a cheap vacation. …Read More!

Haley, Baldwin Cleanup In Joplin

A must read for anyone that cares about the people of Joplin and the Chiefs is at si.com, the Monday Morning Quarterback/Memorial Day edition from Sports Illustrated’s Peter King.

He tells the story of the visit by Chiefs QB Matt Cassel and first-round draft choice WR Jonathan Baldwin to Joplin last Thursday, where they spent the better part of the day providing whatever help they could. Whether it was in autographs, conversation, or muscle in helping the clean up, Cassel and Baldwin were at Ground Zero of the destruction.

“It was the most shocking thing I’ve seen in my life, and I lived through being in the epicenter of a major earthquake,” Cassel told King. As an 11-year old, he saw the Cassel family home destroyed in the 1994 Northridge Earthquake in southern California.

“The devastation is like a nuclear bomb went off. Huge trees, 100 years old, ripped out by the roots, a car thrown up into the middle of a tree. It’s one of those things you can’t imagine unless you’re there.”

Said Baldwin of his Joplin experience: “Humbling; it touched my heart to be able to do something, anything. We felt we touched a few people’s lives, and after something like that, you need to know people care about you.”

Here’s the link to the whole story. If you haven’t heard the details, it’s a must read.

With Gratitude … Memorial Day Cup O’Chiefs

Memorial Day is part of the American calendar thanks to a group of freed slaves in Charleston, South Carolina, who in 1865 decided to honor Union soldiers who had died fighting in the Civil War by decorating their gravesites. Thus the last Monday in May each year became Decoration Day, changing to Memorial Day officially over 100 years later.

What started as a day to honor those who served and gave their lives for our country in military service is now a day when we honor all those who have passed.

There have been some giants involved with the NFL, pro football and the Chiefs that have left us since last Memorial Day. The two biggest never played a down, but are pictured above in “Mr. Music” Tony DiPardo and “Mr. Kansas City” Bill Grigsby.

DiPardo and Grigsby became part of the Chiefs in 1963, the franchise’s first season in Kansas City. In a different time and place where pro football, especially the so-called “other” league in the American Football League, was not the country’s most followed sport. The salesmanship and enthusiasm that Tony and Bill brought to the scene helped Lamar Hunt establish the Chiefs franchise. History showed us it was not an easy sell, but eventually pro football thrived on and off the field in Kansas City and environs. …Read More!

Blake Reports From Joplin

We continue to keep our thoughts and prayers with the good folks of Joplin and their recovery from last weekend’s brutal tornado.

Blake Thomas is one of our loyal readers and he’s been around this site since Day No. 1. He provided a report after spending last week with family in Joplin. I thought I would share it with you.

Hello Bob,

I have been in Joplin this week helping my mother after the Joplin tornado, and finally got a chance to catch up with Chiefs news. I was grateful to see your posts about Joplin and reports from Dan. The most important thing to me is that my mother and the family survived the tornado and are doing well despite losing their home. It is still shocking that the neighborhood where I grew up is gone, along with over a quarter of the city.

Many volunteers have come to our neighborhood during the clean up offering help, food and water. Every few minutes someone comes down the street offering food and a cold drink. My family will be fine, but I also hope people will not forget Joplin as the rebuilding will take many months. I have attached a photo (above) of my mother’s house with our message if you would like to use it to thank you and your readers for their support of Joplin.

Joplin will be back and even stronger. Thank you again for your help.

Blake Thomas

The recovery of Joplin will not happen in a week, a month, or even a year. These people will need our attention and support for a long time. Again, if you have it available, or for whatever reason haven’t given before, any contribution will help these people.

There are many avenues of support where you can contribute. We’ve chosen to concentrate on the good folks at the Salvation Army. To make a contribution, the Army has multiple methods:

• Text the world “Joplin” to 80888 to make a $10 donation.
• By phone call 1-800-SAL-ARMY.
• On line at www.donate.salvationarmyusa.org.
• By mail, send checks to: Joplin Tornado Relief, The Salvation Army, 3637 Broadway, Kansas City, MO 64111.

Owners Cry Wolf … Weekend Keg O’Chiefs

Ahead is a mix of opinion, information and just plain getting it off my chest as the holiday weekend begins and the NFL continues to keep everything locked away.

Here’s what I say.

NATIVES ARE RESTLESS IN INDY

I spent several days in Indianapolis this last week. The town was buzzing like it always seems to be, what with the Indy 500 on the schedule for Sunday, the NFL owners meeting downtown in their annual spring get together and a host of other conventions, conferences and other business type meetings that had the restaurants full every night, and the streets crowded during the day with folks wearing badges.

But Indy is getting nervous because they are scheduled to host the Super Bowl in February. The lockout has everyone concerned but there’s a lot on the line for this city and region with the game. NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell has said many times in the last month that the league is committed to a Super Bowl for Indianapolis. If the league’s labor situation should wipe out this season’s game, then Indy would like get the game set for after the 2014 or 2015 seasons.

This year’s Super Bowl in Dallas turned into a disaster due to bad weather and the poor reaction of local and league officials to the situation. It carried right through game day when there were hundreds of fans that were left without seats to watch the game from, despite the fact they had paid between $800 and $1,000 face value for the seats.

I can assure you that an Indy Super Bowl would not have nearly as many problems, even if the weather turned bad.

…Read More!

Best CFAs In Chiefs History … Morning Cup O’Chiefs

It is the hardest road a player can travel to the National Football League.

When a player finishes his college career and is not selected in the NFL Draft that does not mean his football playing career is over. It does mean that he will have to overcome the longest odds on the board to make it in pro football. A draft choice has an advantage because football capital was used to acquire him in the form of a draft pick. A UFA has an edge because another form of football capital was spent on them – money. Even street free agents have an edge, because they’ve been with at least one other team and have an idea of the lay of the land.

A college free agent or CFA has none of that. If there are 80 players on the pre-season roster, the CFAs will take up the bottom spots on the roster ladder. If there are eight players at a position, then the CFA will be No. 8. To make the roster, he will have to jump over at least five or six of the other players.

What it all means is this – a CFA that enjoys a successful NFL career is one tough hombre. Over the years, the Chiefs have had a number of CFAs that rank among the best players to wear the red and gold uniform. In fact, they have the rarest of rare pro football gems – a CFA that ended up in the HOF, the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio. CB Emmitt Thomas (above) ranks among the game’s defensive greats, and it mattered not to any of the Chiefs coaches he played for or the teammates he played with that he was not drafted.

Along with Thomas, here are the best CFAs in club history.

…Read More!

Another Long-Time Employee Fired

The total dismantling of the Chiefs organization by Clark Hunt has continued with another long-time employee being shown the door.

Larry Clemons, who worked in the team’s business office for 37 years was let go last Friday. At the time of his firing he was the longest tenured employee with the organization. Anyone carrying that title has had a bull’s eye on his back for the last two years.

Clemons joined a group of more than three dozen employees with long tenures who have been fired, laid off or “retired” since January of 2009. Only a handful of those jobs were on the football side, where GM Scott Pioli makes the decisions. The rest were employees in other parts of the team operation. In most cases those fired had one thing in common – they had been with the team for more than 15 years.

Just two years ago, Clemons, former team president Denny Thum and coaching department secretary Ann Roach were the longest tenured employees. They all dated to a time when Hank Stram was still the head coach. Now, all three are gone. Thum was fired in September 2010 and Roach left the organization in May of 2010 with a retirement that she was told she was taking.

It’s been a sad destruction of a business operation that was one of the best in the NFL and one that helped make the Hunt family many millions of dollars over the last three decades.

Now, they are just needless additions to the ranks of the unemployed.

Best UFAs In Chiefs History … Morning Cup O’Chiefs

From the moment it became a fact of NFL life in 1993, free agency has been part of the personnel picture. The next season introduced the salary cap to the league. That limit on salaries was in place until the 2010 season, when the league went without one due to the owners’ decision to end the labor agreement early.

At one point or another over the last 17 years every team in the league has at least dipped a toe in the free agency waters. Some like the Washington Redskins, Dallas Cowboys, Oakland Raiders and New York Jets dove in head first. Others like the Pittsburgh Steelers and Indianapolis Colts took part on a very limited basis. The rest of the league’s teams – including the Chiefs – were on and off the free agency freeway, sometimes spending millions, other times keeping their wallets hidden.

There’s enough evidence and history now that the league has learned signing a boatload of unrestricted free agents does not guarantee championships, or even more victories than defeats. No team has discovered that fact more than Daniel Snyder and the Redskins. He’s dropped hundreds of thousands of dollars in signing bonuses and salaries to high-priced UFAs and does not have a Super Bowl trophy to show for the expenditure.

And what of the free agency record of the Chiefs? Two of the best running backs to wear a Kansas City uniform came through free agency in Priest Holmes (above) and Marcus Allen. There are others that had a big effect on the team in the last 15 to 20 years.

Here are the best unrestricted free agents the Chiefs have signed in the free agency period since 1993. Plus, there’s one extra from the long forgotten Plan B free agency that came in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

…Read More!

Dan In Joplin Reports In

One of our more frequent visitors to the site is Dan in Joplin. If you’ve spent any time reading the comments to posts then Dan and his thoughts are well known to you.

Dan checked in with us and he and his family are fine, not so with his sister and her family. Here’s his report:

“Hey Bob and guys, my family and I are fine. We live just east of the damage and we were spared. All gifts that can be given are much appreciated and NEEDED, but the thing we need most is your prayers!!! God inhabits the praise of his people and even though there has been major loss of life and injury, there is much to praise Him for in the thousands of lives that have been spared! The stories I have heard from family and friends are simply amazing! Pray for the families affected and the community as a whole. I ask a special prayer for my sister and her husband as their home was demolished. They are fine, but very shaken as you can imagine! Thank you and God bless.”

Dan, our prayers are with you and your family, your sister and her family and all those good people of Joplin who are suffering. God speed.

Those looking to help, here are avenues where you can donate to the Salvation Army for their efforts in Joplin:

• Test the world “Joplin” to 80888 to make a $10 donation.
• By phone call 1-800-SAL-ARMY.
• On line at www.donate.salvationarmyusa.org.
• By mail, send checks to: Joplin Tornado Relief, The Salvation Army, 3637 Broadway, Kansas City, MO 64111.

Best SFAs In Chiefs History … Morning Cup O’Chiefs

They are referred to as Street Free Agents, but SFA could also be SCFA or Second Chance Free Agent.

An SFA is a player that was found wanting by a pro football team that signed him to a contract and then after a period of time released him. He’s then “on the street” available to sign with any team in the league.

Every NFL team has SFAs in their past that made history for their performances. The Chiefs organization had one of the finest SFA’s in pro football history in Hall of Fame quarterback Len Dawson. Until he clicked with his former college coach Hank Stram as the starting quarterback for the Dallas Texans in the 1962 season, Dawson had been a major disappointment as a pro football player.

He was drafted in the first round by the Pittsburgh Steelers; they selected him with the fifth choice of the NFL Draft in 1957. The sixth-choice belonged to the Cleveland Browns, who desperately wanted Dawson – an Ohio native. When the Steelers grabbed him first, the Browns had to settle for a running back out of Syracuse named Jim Brown.

In three seasons with the Steelers, Dawson played behind Hall of Fame QB Bobby Layne and ended up starting one game. He was traded in 1960 to the Cleveland Browns, where he started one game in those two seasons for head coach Paul Brown. After the ’61 season, Dawson asked for his release and Brown gave it to him.

That’s when he signed with Stram and the Texans. It was a move that was barely recognized in Dallas when it happened and caused no ripples across the face of pro football. Yet, it would prove to be one of the finest SFA signings in football history. Dawson’s career was such that he was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1987.

…Read More!

Helping Our Neighbors – Update

Television brings the world into our living rooms on a 24-hour basis.

It allows us to watch world events and disasters that not so many years ago would have only been a black & white picture in the daily fish wrap.

So when we see the tsunami that destroyed so much of a Japanese coastal village, we are mesmerized by the pictures. Tuscaloosa and other places in northern Alabama are turned upside down and television brings the devastation right to us.

But nothing that has ever come through the line of my television has ever been as horrific as the pictures that have come out of Joplin since Sunday evening. This isn’t some far off place where Mother Nature has destroyed lives; it’s right down the road, Highway 71 to Joplin, about 2½ hours away. When my daughter was in graduate school at the University of Tulsa, I drove through Joplin on a regular basis. There are landmarks that I knew there that no longer exist.

There are a number of subscribers and regulars on the site that have identified themselves as resident of Joplin. Without a doubt, the average pro football fan in the southwestern corner of Missouri is a Chiefs fan. I’ve tried to connect with those folks in the last few days but I’ve heard nothing back. I hope that simply has more to do with the inability to communicate because of the destruction.

Nobody in the world cares more about those in need than the people of the United States. Please take the time in the next few days to help in some manner. One of the easiest ways is to take part in the bottled water drive being coordinated through the Chiefs. On Wednesday from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. they will be collecting bottled water at Arrowhead Stadium.

The Chiefs also announced Tuesday night that FEMA officials have asked for donations of work gloves, batterries of all types, heavy duty trash bags and flashlights. Those can be made on Wednesday at Arrowhead as well.

Just go the store, discount club or gas station, grab a couple cases of water, put them in the trunk and head for any entrance to the Truman Sports Complex. Volunteers will be there to unload for you. It’s a simple gift, but so vital to help the people that have lost everything.

Donated items will be accepted in Lot C on the east side of Arrowhead. The bottled water will be distributed by the Salvation Army at their four mobile feeding kitchens that are currently in Joplin. Kansas City’s Fry-Wagner Moving and Storage Company is trucking all the water to Joplin. Cash and check donations will also be accepted in Lot C. All checks should be made payable to Heart-to-Heart International. The donated funds will be divided between the recovery efforts in Joplin and Reading, Kansas.

Player Profile – WR Verran Tucker

In preparation for what hopefully will be a 2011 NFL season, we will present player profiles of some of the less known potential contributors on the Chiefs roster. We start today with WR Verran Tucker and will bring you others in the coming days and weeks.

PERSONAL FILE

Verran Mitchell Tucker

Born – June 26, 1988, in Torrance, California

Hometown – Tucker grew up and spent time in various towns in Los Angeles, from the Fairfax district near West Hollywood, to Torrance in the South Bay area and Lynwood, which is south of downtown Los Angeles.

2010 PRO CHRONOLOGY

April 26 – After going undrafted, Tucker signed as a college free agent with the Dallas Cowboys.

July 23 – He was released by the Cowboys before they went to training camp.

July 31 – Signed with Chiefs just as they are opening training camp in St. Joseph.

September 4 – Released by Chiefs in the roster cut to 53 players.

September 5 – Signed as one of the eight players to the Chiefs initial practice squad.

October 23 – He was promoted to the Chiefs active roster.

October 24 – Tucker played in first NFL game, working special teams and some offense against Jacksonville.   …Read More!

Filling Roster Spots … Morning Cup O’Chiefs

When the NFL returns to business, among the first items on the league’s agenda will be the three forms of free agency – street free agents (SFA), unrestricted/restricted free agents (UFA/RFA) and college free agents (CFA).

Here’s a free agency primer:

• SFA – They are known as street free agents because they are “on the street” out of work, with no affiliation after being released by one of the other NFL teams. Within the SFA’s are two categories – players without jobs because they were at the end of their careers and players without jobs because they are at the start of their careers. On last year’s roster Tim Castille, Leonard Pope, Ryan Lilja, Thomas Jones, Brian Waters, Shaun Smith, Wallace Gilberry and Andy Studebaker were just a few of the SFAs.
• UFA/RFA – These are players who were employed, but their contracts have expired. The difference between unrestricted and restricted will depend on the rules worked out in the labor agreement. Previous rules had players with four years experience being unrestricted, three years were restricted. Last year without the salary cap, it was six years for unrestricted status. Last season, the Chiefs had four UFAs: WR Terrance Copper, NT Ron Edwards, LB Demorrio Williams and S Jon McGraw.
• CFA – These are players coming out of the college ranks who were not selected in April’s NFL Draft. On the roster as CFAs were Mike Cox, Rudy Niswanger, Jovan Belcher, Cory Greenwood and Rick Price.

…Read More!

Breaking The Rules … Morning Cup O’Chiefs

It’s a growing topic of conversation and speculation around the locked out NFL – how much contact is going on between coaches and players?

Under the rules of the lockout established by the league’s legal eagles, club employees are not allowed to communicate with players. No phone calls, no e-mails, no tweets, no leaving messages on their Facebook wall. If a coach and a player should happen to run into each other at Walmart, they can say hello, how are the kids, nice weather we’ve been having, but that’s it.

The threatened penalties for fraternizing during the lockout are job termination and the potential loss of draft choices. Various media outlets have reported there are coaches and club personnel breaking the rules on a regular basis. There’s nobody willing to comment on the record, or name names, so these illegal conversations remain nothing more than conjecture.

Let me assure you of this – those chats are happening and they are likely going down all over the league. After more than 35 years of hanging around the NFL there is absolutely no way anyone can convince me that the coaches and players haven’t found a way to communicate. In the end, those two groups are going to be working closely like they always have and generally that’s a bond far greater than the one between so-called union brothers.

In fact, if I was the owner of an NFL team, I’d make sure my coaches were breaking the rules and doing it on a regular basis.

…Read More!

Javier’s Story … Morning Cup O’Chiefs

“At 5:10 p.m. on April 27, Javier Arenas, like many Tuscaloosa residents, was watching the local news as the emergency sirens blared.”

Thus begins a remarkable story in this week’s edition of Sports Illustrated. Chiefs nickel back and returner Javier Arenas survived the tornado that ripped through Tuscaloosa, Alabama, three weeks ago.

When your copy of SI lands in your mailbox in the next few days, make sure to stop and read Lars Anderson’s story about the tornado and the University of Alabama athletes that found their lives changed by that eventful day. If you don’t subscribe, here’s a link to the story.

Arenas grew up in Tampa, but played his college football for the Crimson Tide, including being a key member of the ’09 Alabama national championship team. He has a home in Tuscaloosa. “It’s where I’ve experienced the best memories of my life,” Arenas said. “Alabama football is a religion here. We don’t have any professional teams. You can walk into any living room in the state and they’ll have either an Alabama logo or an Auburn logo. The devotion of the fans is unlike anything I’ve ever seen anywhere.”   …Read More!

Win For Will … Morning Cup O’Chiefs

That’s one down for Will Shields. There’s another big one to come for the former Chiefs guard.

Shields was named on Tuesday as part of the Class of 2011 that will be inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in South Bend, Indiana. The induction ceremonies will happen in December at the annual National Football Foundation dinner at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York.

He is the 22nd player or coach who worked for the Texans/Chiefs over the last 51 seasons that gained induction into the College Hall. (See list at end of the story.)

There is no question that Shields deserved the college honor and what he accomplished over four seasons where he played for Hall of Fame coach Tom Osborne’s Huskers. He was All-Big Eight three times, a unanimous All-America as a senior and the winner of the Outland Trophy in 1992 as the nation’s best interior lineman. Shields was part of two conference winning teams, four bowl teams and Nebraska had a 37-10-1 record in his four seasons playing for Osborne.

But his qualifications for the next step are every greater – the Pro Football Hall of Fame. …Read More!

Will Shields Enters College Hall of Fame

From a national ballot of 79 candidates and a pool of hundreds of eligible nominees, the National Football Foundation & College Hall of Fame, announced Tuesday the 16-person class of 2011 for induction into the Hall.

That group includes former Nebraska and Chiefs G Will Shields. Before he was the Chiefs third-round draft choice in 1993, Shields was a three-time All-Big Eight Conference pick and winner of the Outland Trophy as the best interior lineman in the college game.

He played in 223 games with 222 consecutive starts over 14 seasons with the Chiefs. Shields retired after the 2006 season. The Overland Park resident will be eligible for the Pro Football Hall of Fame next year with the class of 2012.

Another former member of the Chiefs was part of the class: DT Rob Waldrop, a 1994 fifth-round draft choice out of Arizona. Waldrop spent one year with the Chiefs before moving on to great success in the Canadian Football League.

…Read More!

A Chance For Peace? … Morning Cup O’Chiefs

The labor dispute between the NFL and its players sits at one of those forks in the road that often come in this type of financial arm wrestling.

And it’s time to call in a new group of participants to turn this battle into something more understandable. Think of it in football terms, something forgotten so much in this affair. For several months now we’ve been watching a run-and-shoot offense playing against a defense built on the blitz. It’s been showboating time, fancy plays and movements, x’s and o’s dominating the field of play/negotiation. What did Gunther Cunningham call it years ago – Frisbee football, I believe. It’s been a game controlled by non-players, so to speak. It’s been lawyers and judges.

Now it’s time for real, old-fashioned football approach to the situation. It’s time for the labor blood and guts of going head to head in the pit. It’s time for the big uglies on the offensive line banging bodies with the big nasties on the defensive front … in a labor sense.

Let me provide some explanation of what I’m babbling about? On Monday, we had two developments that opened a door just a crack for possibly getting something done and turning the attention back to football and getting ready for the 2011 season. …Read More!

Items Of All Sorts … Morning Cup O’Chiefs

If he hasn’t already been to the Chiefs facility, then I’m willing to predict that long-time Indianapolis Colts assistant coach Tom Moore will be making a visit soon. And maybe, just maybe, he’ll hang around for a while.

Apparently, Moore is out with the Colts, where he had coached for the last 13 seasons. He’s no longer listed as part of the organization on the team’s website. There are 19 coaches listed, but Moore is not one of them. Last year, he stepped out of the play calling role with Peyton Manning and instead held the title of Senior Offensive Assistant. That was after 12 seasons as offensive coordinator for the Colts where he nursed Manning from his rookie season to an NFL passing icon.

Several weeks ago, New York Jets head coach Rex Ryan talked about some of the things he’s doing with his coaching staff during the lockout. He mentioned that he planned to bring in several football minds to meet with his guys and the first name he mentioned was Moore.

I’m going to be that Ryan wasn’t the first NFL head coach to speak with Moore about coming in and providing his experience and mind to be picked. I’m going to bet that Todd Haley made the first call and Moore has either already been in the building, or will be at some point in the coming weeks or months. …Read More!

PLAYER PROFILE – FB SHANE BANNON

PERSONAL FILE

Shane John Bannon

Born – April 20, 1989, in Southbury, Connecticut.

Parents – Parents are Lisa and Robert Bannon.

Hometown – Southbury, Connecticut, is a town of about 20,000 people that sits next to I-84 in the southwest corner of the state. It’s largely a suburban and rural area, with one of the biggest employers being IBM, which built a research facility there in 1987. The land where the town sits was purchased from the Paugussett Indians in 1659 and the town was incorporated in 1787. …Read More!

PLAYER PROFILE – DT JERRELL POWE

PERSONAL

Jerrell Quartez Powe

Born – March 15, 1987, in Waynesboro, Mississippi.

Family – Mother is Shirley Powe. His father is unknown. His stepfather is Billy Terrell. His foster father-legal guardian until he turned 21 years old was Joe Barnett.

Hometown – Waynesboro, a small town of just more than 5,000 people that sits along the Chickasawhay River in the southeast corner of Mississippi, about 12 miles from the Alabama state line. The town sits just outside the DeSoto National Forest. Lumber is the biggest export and business in Waynesboro. …Read More!

Jerrell Powe’s Long Road

Here are some of the milestones and moments on the long road to eligibility for Jerrell Powe.

———- 2005 ———-

January – Powe began working with a tutor, Ginny Lee Crager, a special education teacher and reading specialist at Wayne County High. She was asked to get involved by WCHS head football coach Marcus Broyles.

March – Crager suggests that Powe take some independent study classes on line, programs set up by Brigham Young University in Utah.

August – Powe is declared ineligible to play at Mississippi by the NCAA Eligibility Clearinghouse. To qualify for admission and participation a so-called student-athlete must have at least a 2.5 grade point average in 14 core classes, such as English, math and science, plus a score of at least 17 on the ACT college entrance exam. There is a sliding scale that adjusts for lower or higher GPAs, along with lower or higher test scores. Powe was ruled ineligible because he did not meet the 14 core courses requirement.

August – Powe enrolls at Hargrave Military Academy, in Chatham, Virginia.

———- 2006 ———-

February 1 – For the second time, Powe signs a letter of intent to play at Ole Miss.

April – Powe retakes the ACT test and raises his score from 12 to 18. He scored 22 in reading comprehension when he had the test read to him, rather than having to read it himself.

May – Powe finished taking 14 correspondence courses on line from Brigham Young University. Each course, ranging from geometry to reading comprehension is worth one-half credit. He finished the courses with grades of four A’s, nine B’s and one C.

August 26 – NCAA Clearinghouse rules Powe academically ineligible. Officials expressed concern about the amount of BYU correspondence course work completed by Powe in the given time frame. The NCAA goes so far to release a statement with its decision. “The NCAA stressed it is concerned about Mr. Powe’s long-term well-being and that he has not yet demonstrated he can successfully manage the demands of full-time college academics and intercollegiate athletics,” the statement said. “Among its concerns, the group noted there was insufficient information provided to the NCAA to determine that Mr. Powe completed the work on his own without significant assistance.”

Tutor Ms. Crager reacts angrily to the NCAA’s charge that Powe received too much help, or that someone else did the work on his correspondence courses: “There was no cheating. There was no too much. There is never too much with a child in school. You can cheat on the Internet, but Jerrell didn’t do that. He was right in front of me.”

August 29 – Powe filed suit against the NCAA and the University of Mississippi for their refusal to grant him eligibility. The suit requested the court immediately step into the matter and asked for a restraining order allowing Powe to enroll at Mississippi.

August 31 – The Chancery Court in Lafayette County, Mississippi, issues a restraining order against the NCAA and the University of Mississippi, lifting their block of Powe attending school.

September 1 – Powe is admitted to Ole Miss as a part-time student taking 12 or less credits. He will not take part in any football related events until his appeal is heard.

September 7 – An NCAA review panel meets to review the University of Mississippi’s appeal of its ruling on Powe’s eligibility.

September 16 – Powe announces he’s withdrawing from Ole Miss and that he plans to drop the lawsuit he filed against the school and NCAA. “Although my attorneys are convinced I have met NCAA requirements and that we would win the lawsuit, I do not want to enter and attend Ole Miss under a cloud of controversy.”

Powe added: “By the way, I can read and I can write. My writing may not be perfect, but I am told most medical doctors writing is hard to read too. I have read the articles written about me. The assertions that I cannot read or write are false.”

Back home in Waynesboro, Powe goes back to Wayne County H.S. to take several core courses. He also took a correspondence course with Penn-Foster Career School in Pennsylvania. He also took a part-time job at the Wayne County Jail.

———- 2007 ———-

March – Powe undergoes back surgery.

August 8 – For the third time, Powe signs a letter of intent to attend Mississippi and begins practicing with the Rebels. Within a week of workouts in the pre-season camp, he’s moved into the starting lineup.

August 28 – NCAA again rules Powe academically ineligible, but allows that he can be admitted to Ole Miss and receive full football-related financial aid. But they rule he cannot play or continue to practice until the fall of 2008. “The idea for determining if student-athletes are academically eligible to participate in college sports is to ensure that the rigors of practice and competition do not interfere with the primary reason student-athletes enroll in college — to get an education,” said Kevin Lennon, the NCAA’s vice president of membership services. “Mr. Powe has not achieved sufficient academic success under NCAA rules to permit athletics participation.”

The committees hearing the appeals – the Student Record Reviews Committee and the Initial Eligibility Learning Disability Subcommittee – supported NCAA staff members’ concerns regarding the amount of coursework Powe completed in a short amount of time.

“In order to grant the waiver and appeal, the staff and membership committees were asked to accept that an individual who previously completed just 7 core courses out of a required 14 in his first five years of high school had subsequently completed 14.5 core courses at three different schools concurrently over a four-month period,” read the NCAA release. “The average number of courses a student completes in a year is four.”

The statement also said Powe, who has been diagnosed as learning disabled, hasn’t demonstrated he can succeed academically while practicing and playing college athletics.

August 29 – Mississippi appeals the NCAA ruling.

September 6 – The NCAA upholds the earlier decision and Powe remains ineligible, but he’s allowed to continue to attend class.

———- 2008 ———-

May – After the fall and spring semesters and one summer school class, Powe passes 24 hours and finished with a 2.3 GPA.

July 28 – Southeastern Conference Commissioner Mike Slive declares Powe eligible to play football.

Lockout Potpourri … Morning Cup O’Chiefs

Friday is Day No. 64 of the NFL lockout, actually Day #64 since the owners first closed the doors to the players. It’s easy to forget those doors were open for a few days at the end of April when the players’ injunction was granted. The owners asked for a stay on that injunction with the Court of Appeals.

That stay was granted and has not changed through Thursday. There was a hearing in the Twin Cities on Thursday involving damages for the players after the owners decided to negotiate TV rights contracts that included payments even if there were no games to broadcast in 2011. No decision came down on that.

Mediation sessions between the owners and players begin again on Monday in Minneapolis in front of a federal judge. Those sessions will include real live owners and players, not just the legal beagles.

Makes your head hurt, doesn’t it? If you’ve ever wondered why there are big, tall buildings in every city that are filled with attorneys, it’s because of cases like this one. Both sides in this fight are being run by lawyers. It’s not players, it’s not owners, its lawyers that are competing against each other.

Sad, sad, sad … …Read More!

The Baldwin Effect? … Morning Cup O’Chiefs

How much of an impact will Jonathan Baldwin have on the Chiefs 2011 offense?

History tells us the Baldwin effect will be limited. Rookie wide receivers have the toughest time making a production mark on NFL offenses, maybe tougher than any other position save quarterback.

Pull back the numbers on rookie wide receivers and their ability to produce in the National Football League and it’s not pretty. Every situation has different circumstances that effect a player’s baptism to pro football, so it would be folly to say that results are pre-determined based on position on the field or position in the draft.

And, while history is re-written on an everyday basis, it doesn’t happen very often with rookie wide receivers and their productive impact.

…Read More!

PLAYER PROFILE – DE/LB GABE MILLER

PERSONAL FILE

Gabe Miller

Born – December 5, 1987, in Crested Butte, Colorado.

Family – Parents are Mike Miller and Holly Rasche. He has one brother, Connor. Dad is the Crested Butte Fire Protection District manager. In 1998, Gabe moved from Crested Butte to the suburbs of Portland, Oregon with his mother and brother after his parents divorced. …Read More!

A Quiet Roar … Morning Cup O’Chiefs

The Lakers get swept out of the NBA playoffs and the Celts are close to being sent home as well. The Stanley Cup playoffs are grinding towards their semi-finals with some interesting matchups like an improbable Tampa Bay vs. Boston.

The Players Championship will have the best golfers in the world on the course this week at Sawgrass in Florida. It’s month No. 2 of the major league baseball season, with stories shifting weekly, a couple of no-hitters and remarkable starts for several of the game’s struggling franchises like my Buccos.

And, then there’s the National Football League. America’s favorite past-time, the most popular team sport on the continent, is sitting on the sidelines, watching action in courtrooms and legal offices instead of the practice field and weight room.

Every day that gets ripped off the calendar is another day of tarnish on the NFL. …Read More!

PLAYER PROFILE – QB RICKY STANZI

FAMILY BUSINESS

Ricky Stanzi

Born – September 3, 1987, in Mentor, Ohio, a far northeastern suburb of Cleveland, located on Lake Erie about halfway between Cleveland and Ashtabula, Ohio.

Family – Parents are Joe and Mary Jane Stanzi. He has younger brothers, Vinnie and Joey. Dad is a managing director at Thomas McDonald Partners, LLC. – a financial planning firm in Cleveland. …Read More!

PLAYER PROFILE – CB Jalil Brown

PERSONAL STUFF

Jalil Brown

Born – October 14, 1987, in Phoenix, Arizona.

Family – Parents are John and Chalette Brown. He’s one of six children (three boys and three girls.) Mom home schooled all of her children. …Read More!

PLAYER PROFILE – DL ALLEN BAILEY

PERSONAL STUFF

Allen Bailey

Born – March 25, 1989, in Darien, Georgia.

Family – Parents are Alfred and Mary Bailey. Allen is the second youngest of seven children. The others are Alfred Jr., LaShundra, Clarissa, Francena, Quneton and Alphonso. Alfred is the first mate on the Katie Underwood passenger ferry that runs between Meridian on the mainland and Hog Hammock, the only settlement on Sapelo. Mom is the chef at the Reynolds Mansion, a former plantation home that is now run as a conference center. …Read More!

Player Profile – LB Justin Houston

PERSONAL FILE

Justin Houston

Born – January 21, 1989 in Statesboro, Georgia. Located in southeast corner of Georgia, Statesboro is a city of approximately 28,000 that in its history has been a center of cotton production and tobacco farming. It’s the home of Georgia Southern University. …Read More!

Dishing On Quarterbacks … Weekend Cup O’Chiefs

He’s quick to deflect any type of credit for the New England Patriots selecting Tom Brady with pick No. 199 in the 2000 NFL Draft

But there’s no doubt that Brady’s ascension from the sixth-round draft choice to three-time Super Bowl winning QB has made a lot of people involved a bunch of money, including Chiefs GM Scott Pioli, then the player personnel maven for the Patriots. Pioli joins Charlie Weis, Romeo Crennel, Josh McDaniels, Thomas Dimitroff and several others who should give thanks every single day that the skinny kid from the Michigan and the Bay Area developed into one of the most successful quarterbacks in league history. Brady’s success led to the Patriots success and that led to the chance for big paydays with other organizations.

In the aftermath of Brady’s success, every team in the league is searching for a quarterback diamond in the roughage at the bottom of the NFL Draft. Since Brady was taken at selection No. 199 in the ’00 Draft, there have been 38 QBs taken at the 199th selection or later.

Two of the 38 have amounted to anything memorable – Chiefs starting QB Matt Cassel (7th-230, drafted by the Patriots) and Bills QB Ryan Fitzpatrick (7th-250, drafted by the Rams.) It confirms the fact that Brady was a once in a generation lucky break from the NFL Draft …Read More!

Stuck On Value … Thursday Cup O’Chiefs

It’s a relatively recent phenomenon in the days after NFL Drafts to judge the value of a team’s draft choices.

There’s nothing that pundits, critics, draftniks and even fellow personnel types like to do more than debate the quality of a team’s selections. The conversation always centers on how the drafted players were lined up before the draft and how they went off the board during the seven rounds. Did a team reach to draft a player who was rated significantly lower because they were trying to fill a need? How much did a player fall in the run up to the draft, whether it was a positive drug test or second thoughts by the evaluators?

For instance, there are a host of “draft experts” who say the Chiefs reached for first-round draft choice Jonathan Baldwin, that he wasn’t a talent rated in the first round. There’s the belief that they got lucky when with third-round choice Justin Houston (left), who dropped from the first round to the third.

So called reaches and value picks are in the eye of the beholder. There can be a significant difference of opinion on a player evaluation, one that when placed on a grid, could mean the difference of three or four rounds.

In the last few days I’ve been on the phone with folks around the league who prepared for this draft and know all the bodies big and small, draftable and free agents. I wasn’t looking for anybody to grade the Chiefs ’11 Draft. Rather, I wanted to know where other sources rated the players selected by the red and gold. …Read More!

Strange Draftfellows … Mid-week Cup O’Chiefs

One of the reasons that I’ve enjoyed covering pro football for more than three decades has always been the stories behind the stories.

Those always pop up during the NFL Draft, when more than 250 players are injected into the league all in the span of a few days. Just from that group alone it makes for some strange Draftfellows, odd juxtapositions of young men and their stories.

Like the final two players drafted by the Chiefs – sixth-round NT Jerrell Powe and seventh-round FB Shane Bannon. The differences in their stories at the bottom of the list of nine Kansas City draft choices are probably the most dramatic in the league.

There is Powe, a 6-2, 330-pound monster in the middle of the Ole Miss defense, who is considered one of the best players to ever come up through the ranks of Mississippi schoolboy football. All the biggest programs offered him scholarships – Auburn, LSU, Nebraska, Tennessee, Alabama, Texas A&M, to name just a few.

But his biggest struggles were not on the football field, but in the Mississippi classrooms and courtrooms. This is a young man whose mother said in a deposition that her son could not read. For three years after his high school graduation, Powe could not get the NCAA to declare him eligible to play.

And there is Bannon, who this week is taking his last two finals on the way to a bachelor’s degree in political science at Yale University. His senior thesis was titled “How the New Media Affected Barrack Obama’s Campaign and its Affect on Presidential Campaigns in 2012.” …Read More!

Player Profile – C/G Rodney Hudson

Second-round draft choice Rodney Hudson, Florida State University

FAMILY BUSINESS

Born – July 12, 1989 in Mobile, Alabama.

Family – Parents are Robert and Kathleen Hudson. His parents are divorced. Dad is an officer on the Mobile Police Department. He has two brothers, one older, one younger.

…Read More!

ANSWER BOB – WITH MORE NEW ANSWERS 5/7

Allright, here are the last bunch of answers from your questions about the NFL Draft over the last few days.

As always, a lot of great questions. I can only hope to match some of them with my answers. We’ll do this again sometime when the NFL is focused on the field, not the courtroom.

Newest answers are on top.

———-

May 5, 2011 - Don in ICT says:  Bob, if you had a trump card and could pull one rookie just drafted and bring them to our team who would it be?

Bob says – Tough one there. It would be easy to say Von Miller, or A.J. Green, or Julio Jones, somebody taken early in the first round that they didn’t get a shot at. But I’ll take somebody else they did have a shot at – Clemson DE Da’Quan Bowers. He fell from the top five to the second round because of questions the league still has about his injured knee. Unless there is no way he’s ever going to get to even say 95 percent, I’d bring him in and give him a shot. If he can get back to close to the top of his ability, he’s going to be one motivated guy. …Read More!

Drafting On … Tuesday Cup O’Chiefs

OK, so here I sit, debating whether if I’m going to write today’s dispatch on the NFL Draft or the NFL lockout.

Isn’t that pretty much all there is in football these days? New faces and old problems … the draft or the lockout, the draft or the lockout, the draft or the …

Screw the lockout – it will be the subject of plenty of writing and talking over the next few months. Let’s do more draft, a hodgepodge of thoughts on issues, highlights and leftovers from the three-day NFL Draft.

HEY ROGER, YOU &@%!

How about that greeting the fans at Radio City Music Hall gave NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell. The fans let the main man have it good, chanting “we want football, we want football” the first time Goodell came to the microphone.

A few more times they loaded up on him before they got sidetracked by other issues and people they wanted to boo. I doubt the Commish was surprised by the reaction, although there may have been a surprise at how loud things got. Now, Goodell knows what it’s like to be a player standing on the field and having the fans rip you with every known insult. …Read More!

Grading The ‘11 Draft … Monday Cup O’Chiefs

I was all set to write this epistle around 10 o’clock last night when the real world intervened and news hit that after more than a decade of trying to remove Osama bin Laden from this mortal world, the business was finally served.

So here it’s Monday morning and the focus is back on the draft, and more specifically the Chiefs class of nine players from the 2011 NFL Draft.

I will repeat, grading drafts in the moments after they are completed is the worst type of premature football ejaculation. But at times I do find it entertaining to see what folks covering the draft have to say about what went down. Unfortunately, almost all of those evaluations are based on perception, and those perceptions get repeated so many times it becomes reality.

Pundits are grading the Chiefs drafts anywhere from A- to D+; even one draft jockey gave them an F. So they’ve covered the waterfront on all of these picks.

And my own thoughts reflect that. On one hand, I liked the Chiefs willingness to go out and draft for need is not necessarily a bad thing for a team trying to keep its contender status. On the other hand, I think the Chiefs had one of those drafts that made them look like a team that made it, and was projecting far more from players than what they’ve shown on the college level. Here’s more on both avenues. …Read More!

Player Profile Part #2 – Jonathan Baldwin

Here’s Part #1 focusing on his family and high school.

BODY OF WORK

• Height – 6-feet, 4¼ inches.

  It’s interesting that all through his high school and college days he was listed as being 6-5 and then 6-6. In fact, during football seasons at Aliquippa High School he was listed as 6-5, then in basketball he was labeled as 6-6. That 6-4½ is what he was measured at the NFL Combine.

• Weight – 228 pounds.

  When Baldwin was a youngster, he could not play pee wee football because he weighed too much and was over the weight limit for the league. But he’s never had any reported problems making weight or putting on pounds. The highest weight assigned to him that I found was 235 pounds. …Read More!

The Morning After … Sunday Cup O’Chiefs

From the Truman Sports Complex

If you can’t be enthusiastic about a draft class in the moments after the NFL’s annual selection meeting, then when can you?

The NFL Draft is all about hope and dreams and fixing what’s wrong. When the smoke clears and 250-plus players have been divided up, many things seem possible.

“We became a bigger, faster, stronger, smarter, tougher football team through this draft,” Chiefs GM Scott Pioli said after the three-day, seven-round personnel party was over.

He didn’t add “I think” or “I believe” or “We should be bigger, faster …” He said it as statement of fact. They are bigger-faster-stronger-smarter-tougher now and will be whenever the lawyers allow them to get back on the field of play. …Read More!