Chiefs must consider Pennington

The 6 games he played behind one of the worst offensive lines the franchise has ever seen? Or the fact that Larry Johnson never started a game with Croyle and the Chiefs had virtually no running game to keep defenses off-balance?

Which one of those circumstances gives you such a clear-cut decision that Brodie Croyle being a starting NFL quarterback is "ludicrous"?

Which NFL team do you work for as a personnel consultant, by the way? I'm sure they're all requesting your services, right? Since you can make such definitive statements about a player's potential based on almost no substantial evidence, I would think you'd be highly sought-after by NFL teams.

---Tim

The fact that the man can't stay healthy, for one. He's been injured since high school. He got injured again in college. He got injured last year. You can have all the talent in the world, but if you can't stay on the field, you can't use it.

Number two, the fact that he was drafted by Carl Peterson isn't a confidence-builder, either.

I'm glad you're so confident in him, though. More power to you!

Exactly how many NFL quarterbacks go more than a couple of seasons without missing time due to injuries? Not many. Brett Favre. Peyton Manning. Trent Green (from 2001 through Week 1 of 2006). Other than that, it's pretty much a given that your quarterback will get dinged and miss some games, regardless of who it is.

If you're going to be just another run-of-the-mill Carl Peterson hater, then I'll end my side of the argument with this post, because there's no talking to people who are sheep and just follow what they are told to think by the media. Has Carl Peterson made draft mistakes? Yep. Is there an NFL GM who hasn't? Nope.

For every Ryan Sims you give me, I'll give you a Derrick Thomas. For every Junior Siavii, I'll say Jared Allen. You are prepared to dismiss Brodie Croyle, with no chance to prove himself, based simply on who drafted him? That, my friend, is absolutely ridiculous. Were you immediately ready to give up on Tony Gonzalez? Larry Johnson? Dale Carter? Dwayne Bowe? Will Shields? Tim Grundhard? Jerome Woods? Donnie Edwards? Were those guys worthless, based simply on the fact that they were drafted by Carl Peterson?

Oh, wait, let me go ahead and guess that you will attribute the "good" draft choices to someone else, like Marty or Vermeil. Only the "bad" choices are Carl's, right?

I'm not overly confident in Brodie Croyle. I'm looking at the facts and saying that we DON'T KNOW enough about Brodie to say whether he's going to be the guy to start at quarterback or not. The only way to find out is to put him behind an offensive line that can actually block, with a running game that can actually be effective. Brodie may go out there with a good line and a good running game, and absolutely fall flat on his face and turn out to be a failure. He also might turn out to be a heck of a quarterback. We won't know until we see it, either way.

Writing off a player before they are given any realistic chance is a good way to lose some good players.

It's common sense. Don't let your blind dislike for Carl Peterson distract you from that.

---Tim

Not blind dislike. Didn't say Carl has not had some decent picks, but I noticed there were no QBs on your list; but, I'll give you Matt Blundin and Mike Elkins, for starters. Feel free to give me the quality QBs he did draft.

Anyway, the Chiefs aren't in any different boat than a lot of other teams without a quality QB; there's not a lot of them to go around, and I'm not confident that a guy that's had injury problems since high school will suddenly turn into Iron Man.

It's just an opinion of a degenerate gambler who's watched insanely too much NFL and NCAA football over the years, that's all. You have your opinion, and I have mine. If we all had to work in the personnel department of an NFL team to have one, it'd be a quiet blog...

I'm not saying we're not all allowed to have opinions. But stating your opinion as fact takes it out of the realm of "opinion" and makes it fair game to be proven wrong. You don't believe Brodie Croyle can be a true NFL starting quarterback. That's fine that you believe that. It doesn't make it a fact.

Now then...on to your argument about Carl Peterson and drafting quarterbacks. You want examples of Carls success at drafting quarterbacks? There are none. Along those same lines, would you like me to list for you the other NFL franchises that have had basically the same luck in drafting successful quarterbacks? Nearly every single one of them. As you said in your post, it's not easy. There aren't very many true top-flight NFL quarterbacks who emerge for the teams that drafted them. There are a staggering number of failed high-round draft choice quarterbacks for nearly every NFL franchise, not just the Chiefs.

We've got teams like the Colts, Steelers, Eagles and Bengals, who hit homeruns right out of the box with guys like Peyton Manning, Ben Roethlisberger, Donovan McNabb and Carson Palmer. Other than that, can you name for me any NFL franchise that has successfully drafted a blue-chip NFL starting quarterback? Particularly in the higher rounds of the draft?

I think it's a stretch to give that much credit to teams like New Englad, Dallas or Jacksonville, who all but clumsily stumbled into finding eventual stars like Tom Brady (6th Round), Tony Romo (undrafted) and David Garrard (4th Round, who only emerged after Byron Leftwich flopped as a high pick). They found those guys, and it worked out for them. Those teams didn't see visions of Superbowls and All-Pro seasons when they acquired those respective players.

After that we've got teams who look to be on the right track, but still can't be supremely confident that they have their championship-caliber QB. Teams like Oakland (Russell), Denver (Cutler), San Diego (Rivers), Washington (Campbell), etc.

Beyond that? Nearly everyone has swung and missed when it comes to drafting quarterbacks. The widespread notion that lack of success in finding quarterbacks in the draft is somehow a "Chiefs problem" or a "Carl Peterson problem" simply isn't true. Jim Druckenmiller? J.P. Losman? David Carr? Byron Leftwich? Akili Smith? Tim Couch? Kyle Boller? Patrick Ramsey? Alex Smith? Michael Vick? Joey Harrington? Cade McNown? Rex Grossman? (That's 2 for the Bears in less than 10 years...ouch.) They're all failures. The jury is still very much out on Aaron Rodgers, Vince Young, and Matt Leinart, along with this years highly-touted rookies like Matt Ryan and Joe Flacco.

This is a long post, I understand, but I hope you take the time to read it, because I'm genuinely enjoying this discussion. My point in all of this is: drafting quarterbacks might be the single most difficult facet of personnel that an NFL team can contend with. Has Carl been a failure at finding quarterbacks in the draft? Yep. But let's all look at the facts and agree that nearly the entire NFL is standing right along with the Chiefs in that same category. Forutunately (or unfortunately, depending on your outlook), the Chiefs have had a lot of success in selecting good veteran quarterbacks who came in to start. I'm just hoping that they give Brodie Croyle a reasonable chance to prove himself before writing him off and moving on to the next plan.

---Tim

So, basically, the only thing we disagree on is the fact that I used too much hyperbole in my original post? : )

It wasn't meant to be a factual statement, though it was a factual statement of my opinion.

I just am of the opinion that based on what I've seen of Croyle at Alabama, where he did have one decent season; the fact that he has been injured since high school and he's a pretty spindly guy; the fact that as an organization under Carl Peterson, the Chiefs have never developed a young QB (and that may or may not be all Carl's fault, but it's still accurate); and merging all that with what we agree that even under the best of circumstances is one of the most difficult positions to find success in, just gives me the feeling that he will more likely end up in this group, rather than among the others:

Jim Druckenmiller? J.P. Losman? David Carr? Byron Leftwich? Akili Smith? Tim Couch? Kyle Boller? Patrick Ramsey? Alex Smith? Michael Vick? Joey Harrington? Cade McNown? Rex Grossman? (That's 2 for the Bears in less than 10 years...ouch.)

Couldn't have said it better myself. That transaction would be detrimental to this team.

Pennington is better than Huard.

Among NFL quarterbacks with at least 1,500 pass attempts, Chad Pennington's 65.6 career completion percentage ranks best ALL-TIME.

Great backup and mentor for the younger Croyle and Thigpen.