Patrick Mahomes & Our Chiefs Get More Great Press

Yessir and ma’am, our Chiefs are getting yet more great press, what with being led by the magic and strength that is and that we get from and with Patrick Mahomes.

Top storyline for each Week 10 NFL game | Yardbarker.com

What they have to say:

Arizona Cardinals at Kansas City Chiefs: Patrick Mahomes, NFL MVP?

The answer is a resounding yes. It’s also highly unlikely that this second-year quarterback will somehow take a step back in the MVP race Week 10 against a two-win Arizona Cardinals team. We’re honestly just running out of expletives to define what Mahomes has done for the 8-1 Chiefs on the season.

In addition to already breaking multiple records, Mahomes is completing 66 percent of his passes while leading this offense to an average of 36.3 points per game. He’s on pace for 5,400 total yards and 55 total touchdowns. It’s now up to Patrick Peterson and the Cardinals to somehow slow him down at Arrowhead come Sunday. Good luck with that.

GO CHIEFS!!

An Open Letter To White America

Dear White America,

Don't like the silent protests during the National Anthem at NFL games?

Fight for justice. Fight for more equity for all. Fight for fairness.

Do something. Do something about it. Stand up for what's right.

Sincerely,

The rest of America

Some Relevant Missouri History

I saw this today from the New York Times. Given the presidential election currently proceeding, it's interesting to see how we've developed and changed--at least somewhat--and where our past leaders and current policies came from.

Choosing a vice-presidential nominee has never been easy, but once upon a time the candidate at the top of the ticket didn’t have to sweat it, as it wasn’t his decision.

In the latter half of the 1800s, the power to pick a running mate often belonged to the party bosses who ran the local political machines. They helped determine turnout, which helped decide elections. Their strategy centered on geographic balance.

One of the their last great convention victories came on this day in 1944, when they replaced on the ticket President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s vice president, Henry A. Wallace, with Harry S. Truman, a Missouri senator.

Truman wasn’t the top choice of likely Democratic voters. A Gallup poll that July found that 65 percent preferred Wallace, and Truman came in eighth place, with just 2 percent.

Roosevelt didn’t want him either. The three-term president said that if he were a delegate, he would back Wallace, whom conservative party bosses opposed. Roosevelt’s wishes were ignored, and when a delegate tried to enter the vice president’s name for the nomination, the day’s proceedings were quickly adjourned.

The decision was momentous, as Roosevelt died less than three months into his fourth term and Truman ascended to the presidency. Today, it’s customary for a convention to honor the presidential nominee’s choice for vice president.

Link:  Harry S. Truman | whitehouse.gov

On the Chiefs, Looking to August

MSN News ran this today under the headline

32 players whose NFL careers can either flourish or falter

Kansas City Chiefs – OT Eric Fisher

The No. 1 overall pick from 2013 looks to build off of his first season as Alex Smith’s blindside protector. In 2014, Fisher allowed seven sacks and 24 hurries. Kansas City’s

offensive line needs to be anchored by Fisher as they allowed overachieving center Rodney Hudson to depart in free agency.

 

 

 

 

The Baltimore Orioles Huge Screw-Up

The topsy-turvy world that is Baltimore right now.

It's bad enough the police force there has a bad reputation for roughing up and/or killing anyone, let alone one certain group of people, in this case, blacks. Heaven knows that's bad enough.

Then, one more time, a black man is taken into custody and ends up dead. It doesn't look good. It looks beyond bad.

So the man does die and lots of other black Americans are outraged and protest, not surprisingly. Riots break out, stores are burned, looting takes place.  It's not good. It's beyond not good.

Reacting to that, the city's baseball team cancels 2 baseball games but finally figures they need to go ahead and play a game.

But instead of going ahead and playing the game and calling it out publicly so they could pull the city together, they go forward with the game WITHOUT FANS. They shut out the fans, shut out the public:

Read more here: http://www.kansascity.com/sports/mlb/article19876623.html#storylink=cpy

Orioles Play in Eerily Empty Stadium

No cheers for Baltimore Orioles during win

And it's not like other organizations in the city didn't try to pull the people together. The libraries got it:

Baltimore libraries stay open to provide community support

And the symphony orchestra, for crying out loud, got it:


The Baltimore Orioles and Major League Baseball could have seized this moment, thrown open the doors to their game and given everyone memories for years to come but a great afternoon they need and needed now.

And sure, it would have needed police and security there when they're also needed across town but call out more National Guard. Put them on the scene. Then have the game and have everyone revel in everything Baltimore and Baltimore pride. Pull everyone together---black, white, poor, wealthy, middle and working class, everyone.

Instead, they lock everyone, all the fans out and play to an open stadium, instead. What a huge, important, possibly transformative situation. Lost.

Bloody brilliant.

Kansas City isn't on this list???

I'm shocked.

10 Worst Sports Cities in America
Stunned.

All these suck worse than us and our teams.

Kansas City Chiefs History: On this day

On Jan. 15, 1967, the first Super Bowl was played as the Green Bay Packers of the National Football League defeated the Kansas City Chiefs of the American Football League, 35-10.

The flip side of the story on the Chiefs fans and Matt Cassel

KCTV5

It seems the media and the Chiefs' own Eric Winston were mistaken about the booing of quarterback Matt Cassel, just as an earlier commenter here, who was at the game, stated. From the sounds recorded here, on this KCTV-5 video, straight from the game, the fans were suppporting Cassel, not going negative.

Our Royals: This moment in time

What can you say?

It's Saturday night. (Sort of. It's late Saturday. Actually, it's Sunday morning but forget that).

It was Cinco de Mayo Saturday. (Forget about going down Southwest Boulevard. Yikes. That was crazy).

It's a huge and very full moon.

So beautiful.

And what happens?

Our own Kansas City Royals Major League Baseball Team beat the illustrious New York Yankees---AGAIN.

5 to 1.

We're two of 3 games on them.

Sure, we have to play them one more time tomorrow afternoon but right now we're two up out of three games for having beat them.

Wow.

That's a stunner.

What a gift.

So, tomorrow?

If I had to bet, I'd say we're going down.

But hope?

Sure, I hope we win.

It seems doable all of a sudden.

We've won 6 of our last 9 games.

And we beat the Yankees.

Twice.

Maybe--hopefully--we can do it again tomorrow.

Here's hoping, ya'll.

Link: http://www.kansascity.com/2012/05/05/3596639/royals-beat-yankees-5-1-take-series.html

Royals in the news, just not for winning

No, we know the Royals aren't winning so far this year but they got in the news because this little boy thought they needed the baseball more than if he kept it. Link: http://www.thepostgame.com/blog/clip-board/201204/kid-tosses-baseball-back-royals

Chiefs: How about Tebow?

Hey, we couldn't--no way--be taken seriously for attracting Peyton Manning but now, with Tim Tebow out in Denver and Peyton Manning in, it seems like it would make some good sense to possibly go after the far younger Mr. Tebow instead. We could put up with the grandstanding prayers on field, as long as he brought us wins each week. It seems like the price would be easier than Peyton's and he's younger and we could, hopefully, build the team around him a bit. Whaddya' say, Clark? Link: http://sports.yahoo.com/nfl/news?slug=lc-carpenter_tim_tebow_peyton_manning_elway_broncos_031912

Kansas City sports teams dodge a bullet

Well, here's some good and maybe even surprising news for Kansas City today. There's a list out right now on Yahoo! News from 24/7 Wall Street of "The 12 major league teams running out of fans" and get this--we're not on it! Yahoo! I thought sure the Royals might be, if even at the bottom of the list. Oakland Raiders? Athletics? Yes and yes, but not us. We may not be winners in the last couple decades, at least, but at least we're loyal, eh? Link to original post: http://sports.yahoo.com/top/news?slug=ys-247wallstreet-pro_teams_losing_fans_091511

Notes on a Mayor

I have to say, I think the Mayor has this one right.

You'll have to see the Star this morning (Pg. A4) and its article about the mayor saying that $2 million of the city's money should no longer go to the Truman Sports Complex.

Yeah. You bet. He is right. (for once?).

And for a lot of good reasons:

First, it's not contractual. This was never set in stone anywhere and we've been doing it just to be "nice guys."

But you know what? This is in the midst of the worst recession in 80 years, since the Great Depression. Times are difficult, to say the least, and that's the 2nd reason.

Third, we really could use that money on our infrastructure like roads and bridges and sewers and who knows what all. We just hope the mayor can keep his mouth shut the rest of the time he's in office so it doesn't go to settle more lawsuits against him. (Seriously, have you ever known a Mayor to have had more public lawsuits against him because he's mayor? I can't think of any. I wonder what this clown has cost us so far. Good question. Note to self: possible additional blog entry).

Fourth and finally, both the Chiefs and Royals have taken millions and millions of dollars in taxes from the citizens of Jackson County, Kansas City (and for that matter, from Johnson County and Kansas), even though they are extremely profitable monopoly businesses. They'd have a lot of chutzpah complaining about missing this $2million. (Not that they won't complain about it, it wouldn't be surprising).

Now let's hope that, if they go through with this, the city really does spend the $2 million on street repair.

Coincidentally, there's a campaign being put on right now by the area's Heavy Construction Association to the tune of $110,000 (and possibly more) that starts soon and goes for the next year.

It seems the big boys are starting this "Stop the Nonsense" PR campaing "to pressure the" city "council to spend more general fund money for capital maintenance projects such as roads and bridges."

It seems the budget for these projects is down $7 million and they want it back, at minimum.

Hmmmm. Isn't that what the Mayor said he would do in his campaign for the job he has, make us "The City that Works"?

"An early draft of the group's campaign...shows plans for a broad-based critique of the mayor and council on radio, in newspaper ads, billboards and direct mail to residents."

The mayor will most assuredly bear the brunt of this negative campaign, too. To criticize "the council" is too vague. I'll bet most Kansas Citians can't even name one council member.

So here's one more group aligned against the mayor and our current local government.

It would be nice if those folks would wake up down there and give us the kind of efficient government the mayor promised and that we should, rightly, have, instead of things like Ed Ford's boneheaded idea of expanding the city North with his Tomahawke Ridge boondoggle.

Here's hoping.

Have a great weekend, y'all.