Bob Gretz Interview - A Mid Season Look
I was lucky enough to get together with Bob Gretz again to ask him some questions about the Chiefs. Gretz talks about the Chiefs record, Tyler Thigpen and the QB situation, and Larry Johnson’s recent off the field issues.
Kansas City Chiefs Football: What do you think of the Chiefs record so far and do you think it is a proper indication of where they are at as a football team?
Bob Gretz:Given the rebuilding project and the injuries this team has suffered, I think 1-8 is about right. We can all point to a game or two here or there where they may have been able to win. But I subscribe to the Bill Parcells saying that “you are what you are.” This is not a team that should be 5-4, but has had bad luck. They are 1-8, because that’s what they are.
Kansas City Chiefs Football: Tyler Thigpen has been looking really good these last few games, do you think he is the Chiefs QB of the future?
Bob Gretz: I have no idea at this point whether he’s the QB of the future but I know that he has a chance to lay claim to that designation over these final seven games. If he continues to make steady progression, there’s no doubt he’ll get the first shot at the job. But he’s still got to continue to move forward, continue to protect the ball. He’s due for a bad game; it’s only a matter of time. The question then will be how does he react to that bad game. There are a lot of steps Thigpen still has to make, but he’s doing the two best things any quarterback can do in this situation: he’s available and he’s not turning the ball ovver.
Kansas City Chiefs Football: With Thigpen’s strong play, if he keeps this up for the remainder of the year do you think the Chiefs should still look at a top QB in the 2009 NFL Draft?
Bob Gretz: I don’t know about top. I’m in the process of a lengthy research project on quarterbacks in the draft and the deeper I dig the more I believe that every decade there are maybe three or four QBs who rock solid picks; the rest are gambles not worth taking. I think the Chiefs have a lot of holes to fill and no matter what Thigpen does, quarterback is one of them. First-round pick no, but early draft choice yes.
Kansas City Chiefs Football: Around Arrowhead Stadium I hear a lot of fans say that we are just playing for draft picks right now and that last Sunday’s performance against the Bucs was an ideal performance (playing a good game, but losing in the end) because it shows progress but we still get a higher draft pick with the loss. What are you thoughts on this?
Bob Gretz: Anybody that says this has never been part of a team that has worked its tail off for months to be successful. This team is trying to win. Think about it: would anyone want to associate with a team that is trying to lose.
Kansas City Chiefs Football: Larry Johnson seems to have a hard time staying out of trouble. What do you think about his current situations and how does this affect the Chiefs future at RB?
Bob Gretz: Larry has a lot of ground to make up, starting with the Hunts, to Carl Peterson, Herm Edwards and his teammates. He’s going to have to change and we all know that change is not easy. As for the Chiefs, they’ve always been able to find running backs and I think that will continue.
Kansas City Chiefs Football: Who would you name the mid-season MVP of the Chiefs and why?
Bob Gretz: Right now, there’s no one worthy of that designation.
Kansas City Chiefs Football: Which players have stood out to you the most in the first half of the season and what players do you expect more from?
Bob Gretz: Tank Tyler, Bernard Pollard, Mark Bradley, Tony Gonzalez, Thigpen, and the Brandons, Flowers and Carr have grabbed my atteniton. I expected more from Bowe, Page, Derrick Johnson and Larry Johnson.
Kansas City Chiefs Football: Overall, are you happy with where the Chiefs are as an organization and a team right now?
Bob Gretz: I think the organization moved in a direction it needed to move. They might have been able to soften that blow by signing more veteran free agents in the spring, but that likely would have taken playing time away from young players. It makes real evaluation of Edwards and his coaching staff tough right now. They seem to be good talent evaluators because the young players they have added are good, some very good.
Kansas City Chiefs Football: I see that you started doing some podcast since our last talk. Good job on those, I know that people are enjoying them.
Bob Gretz: The podcasts have been fun. It allows me to do some of what I had been doing for Chiefs Radio for almost 20 years. Luckily, I have some good friends like John Czarnecki, Rick Gosselin and Len Dawson who have been willing to give their time. There’s more on the way as well. Like everything on the Internet, it’s a blank canvas and I can paint it any way that I would like.
Great job Mr. Gretz and you can get more Gretz at his blog.
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Bob Gretz Interview - Four Games Down
I was lucky enough to get together with Bob Gretz again to ask him some questions about the Chiefs. Gretz talks about the Chiefs record, the QB situation, and Tony Gonzalez’s recent comments regarding the record he didn’t break last Sunday against Denver.
Kansas City Chiefs Football: What do you think of the Chiefs record so far and do you think it is a proper indication of where they are at as a football team?
Bob Gretz: I think 1-3 is a good representation of where they are in this rebuilding process. I think the disappointing thing for everyone was how poorly they played across the board against Oakland and in the first half against Atlanta. They could have played better football and still been 1-3, but that’s what happens with young, inexperienced football teams.
Kansas City Chiefs Football: Damon Huard look pretty good against Denver, do you think that if he continues to win that he will be the starter even when Croyle is ready come back?
Bob Gretz: Not if Herm is going to stick with his idea of developing a young team and finding out who can play and who cannot. Damon Huard is not the future of this team at quarterback. Whether Brodie Croyle is remains to be seen, but he needs to play. Look at it this way: based on recent history, there’s a very good chance that if he replaces Huard with Croyle, its only a matter of time before Huard comes back in. Same if he leaves Huard in; it’s only a matter of time before Croyle would have to play. Neither one of these quarterbacks have ever shown they can be a starter for 16 games.
Kansas City Chiefs Football: Branden Albert has now had two injuries and we are only four games into his rookie season. Some people now think he is injury prone, do you agree or disagree with this and why?
Bob Gretz: I think it’s a bit early to slap the injury-prone label on the young man. I hate to harken back to dusty old history, but there were people around the Chiefs (I’m talking coaches and player personnel) who thought John Alt was too injury prone at the start of his career and wouldn’t amount to anything. He only ended up playing 13 years and starting 149 games. Four regular season games into his career is a reach to tag him or any other player with a label.
Kansas City Chiefs Football: There has been a lot of talk lately about Tony Gonzales and his frustration about not breaking the all time record for receiving yards for a TE at home against Denver, what do you think about his comments?
Bob Gretz: I think Tony’s comments were ill-timed and should have been kept to himself. Ultimately Tony was upset because there wasn’t the party or ceremony he wanted. He’s still going to get the record, it’s just not going to happen in the manner he hoped. Hey, that’s life. The focus should have been on the end of a 12-game losing streak and the victory and not an individual record that still can and will be set.
Kansas City Chiefs Football: What players or events that have surprised you so far this season (good or bad)?
Bob Gretz: The Oakland performance was a bad surprise, just for the fact the entire team dropped the ball. As for the individual players, I think they really have played to form so far. They haven’t shown anything that would have been unexpected, either positive or negative. I guess that guy that has grabbed my attention was been LB Eric Walden, picked up on waivers after the final pre-season cut. This is a talented young man, who has already made a mark on the special teams. In practices, he’s becoming more of a factor on the scout team and that’s the surest way to get coaches to start paying attention to you. Reportedly some folks with the Cowboys were upset when Dallas released him and I”m starting to see why.
Kansas City Chiefs Football: Which players have stood out to you the most in these first four games and what players do you expect more from?
Bob Gretz: I think Tank Tyler has been the team’s best defensive player with Bernard Pollard a close second. Tyler is really disturbing things on the inside. Now, he must show he can do that consistently for 16 games. Pollard is starting to show the skills that had the Chiefs excited about him coming out of Purdue. He’s really starting to just play and not worry about being perfect.
I’ve expected more from Dwayne Bowe than I’ve seen. Now, some of that is due to the QB switching, but his drops in the opening game were troublesome. He may have been trying too hard. I expect to see more from him in the future. I also want to see more from Tamba Hali. Unfortunately, Tamba’s been battling a knee injury for two weeks now and he doesn’t get to practice, but plays on Sunday. Maybe the bye week will allow him to get closer to 100 percent, but I think the Chiefs defense needs more out of his spot.
Kansas City Chiefs Football: I have noticed on your blog that podcast are “coming soon”, and I know some out there are looking forward to these. Do you have a timeframe when these podcast might start?
Bob Gretz: I was hoping nobody noticed! My mistake was putting “soon” on the site. Hopefully in the next couple weeks we will be up and running. We’ve run into some technical issues with our platform that had to be overcome and we are on the cusp of doing so. I’ve got some good help, but essentially this is a one-man operation and I’m no geek. I’ve got to get help from real geeks and they have reel jobs. But, my pipes are ready and so is a nice docket of guests that will join me. Until we get the final geek stuff done, however, I’ll keep all that to myself. But it’s coming and hopefully soon.
Kansas City Chiefs Football: As always, thank you so much for your time we always appreciate it.
Bob Gretz: It’s always a pleasure to talk to Chiefs and football fans. Thanks for asking.
Don’t forget to check out Bob Gretz’s Blog.
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Bob Gretz Interview
Filed under: Featured, Interviews, KC Chiefs Football, Roster
Recently we got together with Bob Gretz to ask him some questions about the Chiefs. Gretz talks about his new blog, some surprises of the preseason and has a message for Chiefs fans.
Kansas City Chiefs Football: Congrats on your new blog at bobgretz.com. What are your plans for the blog?
Bob Gretz: Right now we are just trying to grow the website on a weekly basis. We will soon be adding podcasts each week and I think Chiefs and especially football fans will enjoy them. We’ll cover some college football and we’ll increase our overall NFL coverage coming up with the start of the regular season. Where it goes from there, who knows. That’s one thing that I liked about the web when I investigating getting involved: it can be whatever you want it to be. That’s ultimately why I named the site bobgretz.com. What you see is what I want it to be; right now it’s basically Chiefs related, but it doesn’t have to stay that way.
KCCF: What do you think of sports blogging in general?
Bob Gretz: I don’t think the world of sports blogging is any diferent than the world of newspaper writing, sports talk radio and TV: there are some misinformed idiots who clog up the information pipeline with material that’s wrong and poorly reported and there are people who see it and read it and they don’t understand what crap it is. There are also people on the web who do a nice job, who have opinions based on fact and who provide another avenue to the discussion.
KCCF: Which Chiefs’ players have surprised you so far this preseason?
Bob Gretz: There haven’t been too many surprises for me, since I saw all the off-season practices and had an idea for instance that Turk McBride was improved, and Tank Tyler was better and Pat Thomas was pushing for the starting job at MLB.
I guess the one surprise would be RG Adrian Jones. In the off-season practices there are no pads and it’s not real football for the linemen. But once he was in camp in Wisconsin, Jones has been solid the whole time, actually better than I thought he would be. whether that’s good enough for the spot, we still have to see.
Also rookie FB Mike Cox has been a bit of a surprise. He was signed because he played at Georgia Tech for Chan Gailey and knows the offense, but Cox has shown some skills. He should be the fullback.
KCCF: What Chiefs’ players did you expect to see more from this preseason?
Bob Gretz: The obvious is Branden Albert. The injury was a setback for their offense and for him. It’s not something that can’t be overcome if he stays on his rehab course and can get on the field early in September.
KCCF: What are you thoughts about Glenn Dorsey?
Bob Gretz: What a powerful force he’s going to be inside. He’s got some missed practice time to make up, but once he gets his feet under him and the Chiefs coaching staff sees more and more of him in action, I think he’ll show up more and more. He just explodes off the line of scrimmage and he’s going to start drawing a lot of attention from offensive lines. That’s going to help everybody else on that front.
KCCF: Do you think Dantrell Savage has done enough to make the final cut? What about Bobby Sippio?
Bob Gretz: Yes on Savage, and probably no on Sippio. Savage has done everything asked of him and with the exception of his rookie blunder in Miami of stepping out of bounds at the 2-yard line, he’s done a very good job. Sippio has been Sippio, it’s just that the numbers don’t add up for him. Now, that could change early in the season because of the injury suffered by Will Franklin. He’ll be out 2 to 4 weeks, so the roster may have to have an extra WR when it comes to the 53-man limit. That could give Sippio a chance. But right now I would put him sixth, behind Bowe-Darling-Franklin-Price-Webb.
KCCF: Who are some players that you think might not make the final cut that might come as a surprise to some of us?
Bob Gretz: That’s tough to guess because Chiefs fans have been paying attention and they’ve heard the chatter on this site, my site and others, so I don’t think anybody is going to come out of nowhere. Rookie free agents like Cox, LB Wes Dacus and CB Maurice Leggett have real shots at the final roster. I think the final three or four roster spots will be very fluid over the next couple weeks for this team as they investigate the players who are released by other teams.
KCCF: Any advice for Chiefs fans this year as it could possibly be a long one?
Bob Gretz: Chiefs fans need to be patient and I know they are tired of being patient. But I think the organization has done the things necessarily to get this ship turned in the right direction and allows them a chance to build a foundation that will keep this team among the contenders for a long period of time. There is however, a lot of work that remains to be done. The problem the Chiefs had in 2007 was very simple: a lack of talent. Teams don’t go 4-12 because of bad luck. It has everything to do with no having enough good players. They are changing that, but there were a lot of roster holes and there remain some. How quickly this turns around depends on the ability to Herm Edwards and Bill Kuharich to evaluate talent and then the coaching staff to take that talent and make it work.
Thanks again Mr. Gretz.
Bob Gretz’s blog can be found at www.bobgretz.com
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Exclusive Dwayne Bowe Interview
Today is a big day for kcchiefsfootball.com. Today we are posting our first ever exclusive interview… and it’s with Chiefs star WR Dwayne Bowe! Hopefully this is just the first of many. D Bo talks about expectations for the upcoming year, video games and his favorite play from his breakout rookie season.
KC Chiefs Football: There is a lot of talk of the “sophomore slump” in the NFL, do you think you will face this problem and if so what are you planning to do to avoid this?
Dwayne Bowe: I’m not a sophomore, I’m a 2nd year vet and I don’t believe in flopping. Check my history out and as we all know, history repeats itself.
KCCF: What was your favorite moment or play from your rookie year?
D Bo: My first NFL touchdown against the Chicago Bears that wasn’t intended for me.
KCCF: What are your personal goals and your expectations for the Chiefs this season?
D Bo: My personal goals is to reach over 1,000 yards and to reach the pro bowl. I want to take my team all the way.
KCCF: Word on the street is you are a big Halo player, do you like to play Madden as well? And if so what team do you use while playing?
D Bo: I’m a rookie in Halo but for Madden I’m like All Madden and of course I use ME!
KCCF: Speaking of Madden,if you were asked to be the cover athlete would you accept(with the “Madden Curse” and all)?
D Bo: There is no such thing as a curse and when I get my fame up of course I would be honored to accept that.
KCCF: On your blog you have Super Techmo Bowl as your all-time favorite video game, but what is your current favorite video game?
D Bo: The New Metal Gear Solid
KCCF: What is one thing you never leave home without?
D Bo: My playbook
KCCF: What is your favorite sport to play or watch besides football?
D Bo: The NBA when it’s the finals.
KCCF: You have been in KC for a little bit over a year now. What are your favorite things to do off the field?
D Bo: Chill at the crib and eat out at my favorite restaurants.
KCCF: What advice do you have for the current rookie class?
D Bo: Pace yourself but go hard when the time is needed.
KCCF: What veteran(s) that is no longer on the team will you miss the most?
D Bo: By far, Boo aka Eddie Kennison
KCCF: Do you feel any added pressure being the #1 WR going into camp this year?
D Bo: Pressure…what’s that?
KCCF: Which rookies should all of us Chiefs fans be watching out for this coming season?
D Bo: The entire Chiefs rookie class.
Hope you all enjoyed the interview and thanks again D Bo.
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