I've started to come to the conclusion that LT, like QB, is a position you just have to keep taking swings at until you get it right...especially where we are drafting nowadays. I don't care if they draft a LT every year until we get some stability over there... I guess I took for granted Atl, Roaf, Albert, Fisher et al...

I agree, and I'm certainly not advocating that we SHOULD draft Jackson at #31, but Veach has us in a position where taking the what is probably OG #1 that has some OT potential isn't a terrible move.

I'm not saying I would LOVE it. I'm not saying it's the BEST IDEA, I'm saying that even IF that's what they did, you could make a logical argument that they filled the only truly open spot in the starting 11.

Now, I agree with you that there should be other players at other positions that move the needle more for ME, and that could/should set the team up better moving forward, and that's my preference. DE, DT, OT, WR are all spots, for instance, I see wisdom in stocking up early.

Taking Jackson over Conerly or Burden or Egbuka or Trey Amos or Walter Nolen or Kenneth Grant or Derrick Harmon would be criminal, though.

You can probably put Shavon Revel in that category, too.

When you have the highest paid C in the league and are about to have the highest paid RG, too, both on their second contracts, you really can’t invest a 1st round asset in a G if there are similarly graded guys at more valuable positions.

Kill shot.

The data on this is about as awful as it can be, and that’s relying on PfF’s trash OL grading system to measure “return to performance” levels, which is iffy at best.

Darrisaw has missed games every year he's been in the league. Not exactly a running endorsement.

At what point are we allowed to say "Do you know who I am?!?!?"

Have you, Crow and Me EVER been this strongly aligned against a possible Chiefs prospect?

I mean that's 3 guys who's bonafides have been fairly well vetted on this stuff. I mean I think this argument is a 1st round knockout purely on substance but damn...can we start to throw some ad hominems around as well?

When you take the Bar, they tell you not to talk about your answers at break. We did. Everyone does. And so myself and my 3 good friends are over lunch and talking about our answers. And we all said effectively the same things to the handful of iffier questions we saw.

So we knew we'd passed.

Because any one of us might be wrong. Maybe 2 of us. But there were 4 of us and we were all top half of the class students; solid prospects, reasonably intelligent and all studied pretty hard.

We didn't ALL just fail the bar exam. So we knew we were good.

You, Crow and me (you can come too, 'maqe) aren't ALL this wrong on Simmons.

Are we?

So because you cheated on your bar exam then Simmons is certainly a bust because 5 bald guys with goatees all came to that consensus on chiefsplanet

A) It's not 'cheating' sport. Your answers are turned in. They tell you not to do it because it will just stress you out.

B) The wisdom of crowds has a pretty immaculate track record.

You can put these guys on a pedestal if you want - but they're human. Veach has plenty of misses, even in the 1st round and especially when he focuses on a position over raw talent.

If we had Christian Darrisaw at LT nobody would be arguing we should gamble on Simmons. The hyper-focus on him and insistence on ignoring the bright flashing red flags all around him is nothing more than a thinly veiled need pick.

And that's when teams get in trouble. That's when teams get it wrong.

If we take Simmons here -- we'll have gotten it wrong.

I'm high on Simmons and would trade up for him.

There, that help?

Duncan_Idaho has a full head of hair and a beard, sir.

You’re told a dental procedure has a ten percent chance of being successful. (And really, just moderately ok. At best.) You’re shown historical precedent of it failing again and again.

You have multiple alternatives with much higher success rates that are less flashy.

Oh, and you’re told your career prospects will take a major hit if you go with the ten percent shot.

What are you doing?

And throw in that you have to make a huge investment in equipment to even do the ten percent chance procedure.

What are you doing?

1) you’re extrapolating medical data from the past and medical science is constantly improving. - Simmons had a special type of repair if you read up not the normal type.

2) he’s younger

3) it’s not a skill position. - most data on injuries and failures to recover from them come from skill positions. Where cutting and micro adjustments mean everything.

I really hope Simmons goes early so we have no shot of having to discuss his injury for the next several months to years.

Which probably means the Chiefs are gonna take him

Gods I hope not.

A) I'm not extrapolating anything. I've cited odds and his real time outcomes.
B) Duncan spoke to this already, as has Crow. Age has no statistically significant impact on outcomes
C) outcomes for skill position players are BETTER than for big men.

You're just ignoring everything in front of you in the name of hope and perceived need.

I think Veach may do just that. If he does I will scurry to this board to watch the too deep thinkers cry and moan.

I think you're in luck. I got a strong feeling these fatties are gonna go faster and earlier than people are expecting.

This league is starved for ok blockers, much less good ones.

1. Sure. All we have is his word that the double bracing is new/different.
2. There are young guys who had this and were still ****ed. Ryan Williams, Cadillac Williams, Jarod Mayo, JC Jackson.
3) the recovery rates for OL are the WORST with this injury.

Hoping that this guy is different because the surgery repair was a little different is just Hope.

You do just that. I’ll hope we are wrong and that he’s a unicorn because that’s what is best for my team.

Flip side: in two years, I’ll make fun of the smooth brains who are surprised this dude didn’t work out (because the injury ****ed him).

Duncan my boy.....you missed the joke.

If yourself and Dj and crow are one way and I'm the other, based on track records......that's enough to make an informed decision.

I'm always wrong.

And now, I've had to explain my "joke" which just further makes me look like a dumb schmuck.

I won't have much to say, really.

I think it's a mistake.

I'll hope that it isn't. Or more accurately, I'll hope its a poor process that yields positive results.

Even the worst of mad hackers will occasionally get a fastball that they just happen to run into. They may have a .180 BA with twice as many strikeouts as hits, but they will hammer that one ball into the sun because one time, despite the same bad approach, the pitcher threw the ball into the bat.

Taking Simmons is bad approach. It ignores literally every datapoint. It might still work out. The odds are horrifying, but non-zero.

If you told me there was a 1% chance that I'd get die in a car wreck tonight if I took my normal route home from work, I'd take a different route. Not because that 1% is all that concerning, but because it's still 1%. It's high enough above zero to be worth legitimate consideration.

Now if you tell me that the only way to avoid that 1% is to get home via California, I'd not do it. I'd take my chances on the 1%.

But here, there's nothing lost to me by hoping that the 5-10% chance that he works out comes to fruition. So I'll do that.

But I'll still think it was the wrong decision.

I was so proud of this analogy, though.

We're all guilty of that one.

You realize your post missed the mark about halfway through it but dammit, you really like it.

{submit reply}

You will appreciate my subtle, if misplaced, brilliance dammit!

If that happens, I would trust Veech. I think the Chiefs who just having dealt with Niang with this injury probably have as much insight as anyone.

Data was taken between 2010 and 2023. It's not dated.

There isn't really a "special" hidden procedure. The repair happens with sutures or grafting and those can be reinforced or not. He didn't have some magic fairy dust sprinkled on it.

If you realized what that tendon does, you'd see why your statement about skill positions is patently false. It is critical in the transmission of power from your quadriceps to your tibia in knee extension.

When the tendon is torn, that tendon doesn't have the elasticity it used to in order to remain taut and stretch during transmission. Post-repair, it's like putting slack in the rope between your quad and your shin. It'll be like having a weaker quad.

Generally speaking, the athlete will never generate as much power as they could before. That's pretty important for a guy who weighs 325 pounds pushing on other 325-pound dudes.

And age simply doesn't matter.

So when I saw it was reinforced and read up on it, it didn't actually make me feel a lot better.

Because originally I was of the belief that the procedure was one of those 'better safe than sorry' things. Maybe not absolutely vital, but probably the safest approach with the best long-term outcomes.

Then I looked up when that double-grafting approach is used. It's typically used in instances when the tear is catastrophic and/or an earlier repair fails or needs revised.

Saying "Yeah, we did it the really really extreme way -- a way we've known how to do for years and still DON'T do it very often" -- doesn't make me feel a lot better.

An analogy would be "hey, this guy has a shoulder issue. We could've just done an arthroscopic procedure but instead we went in there and aggressively replaced the entire capsule...y'know, just to be safe..."

All that would tell me is that the 'scope WOULDN'T have worked. The thing you normally do for similar injuries wouldn't have gotten the job done. So you had to do the extra aggressive one that you DON'T normally do because it carries with it additional risks.

In this case, the graft is doubled over, right? Wouldn't that just make it MORE taut? Wouldn't that make it MORE likely that he loses flexibility and full range in the joint?

They didn't do it this way to be extra double safe while the folks that did it on Jimmy Graham were like "eh, **** it - the bare minimum will do..."

No, they did it this way because they HAD to.

But hey, when you have a reporter out there tossing out about 5% of the story that she got secondhand from a guy who's clearly vested in controlling the narrative, you should absolutely subject it to its most optimistic possible reading, right?

This double graft thing shouldn't be setting anyone's mind at ease.

Yikes re: the double graft.

So, here's where I'm landing.

Smart organizations that are not desperate will stay the F away.

Dumb, desperate organizations will not. He'll get scooped up by one of them and it will be ballyhooed as a coup for that org, and receive GREAT draft grades.

And then he'll be a bust. Never a good starter at LT. Maybe he can move inside to LG and make it work (though if power is an issue for him moving forward because the left leg is less than it was, that would create different difficulties for him). Maybe he works through it all to be a solid LG. I wouldn't bet on it, though.

The only guy I'm less willing to bet on, who is getting 1st round attention, is Shedeur Sanders.

You're still kinda just hoping. Historical data says no way, Jose.

Simon says Josh Simmons will be off the board when the Chiefs make their first pick. Josh Conerly Jr., OT Oregon, Aireontae Ersery, OT Minnesota, Ozzy Trapilo, OT, Boston College, Marcus Mbow, OT Purdue will still be on the board and at least one of them will be available for the Chiefs 2nd round pick.

Worst case scenario you grab Cameron Williams, OT Texas with the 95th pick in the 3rd round. With decent QB's floating on the board between the 2nd and 3rd round, teams targeting a QB.

I can see the Giants trading up from 3 to the bottom of 2 for Jalen Milroe if they pass on Jaxson Dart in RD 1. I think the Giants will draft Will Campbell, OT LSU with the 3rd overall pick.

Yeah -- I read it and didn't say anything.

A) My analysis is just a little too layperson there. It's what I took from it but...well I'm just a guy.

B) It felt like piling on and maybe some confirmation bias.

So ultimately I got to "Well this makes me feel worse but I can't live on it so I'll let it go..."

But if someone's gonna say it makes things obviously BETTER -- well they'd better be able to support that past "Well Simmons said so..."

Because the most positive reading I could possibly give it was that it's just...there. It doesn't make things better or worse.

There are 6 teams in the first seven picks that need a QB. The only LT worth making a trade like that for is Will Campbell. He's the one legit, blue chipper. After that, maybe Membou.

The only trade that might make sense for both teams is Giants and Chiefs trade first round picks, and the Giants also get the Chiefs 2nd round pick, and conditional picks in 2026.

Yep. And emphatically so, at that.

Hope so also.

This is where I at!

Rumors are Ravens want an OT.

Hahahahahaahahahahahaahahahahahahahaahaha. Funny shit!

"Whatever possible" ended up being too high a price, man.

Technically we traded for him

We get it. You don’t like the pick Granted it is a gamble, but nobody else has the potential upside he has.

When we seat at the end of the round every year, you got to take some chances.

It’s worth noting: Josh Simmons is first OT Chiefs have drafted in first round since drafting Eric Fisher with first overall pick in 2013. That’s crazy!

My guess would be not spending high draft picks on two of the most important positions in football would explain our lack of post season success until recently.

Just a thought. Perhaps we should have at least tried to fill the QB and LT positions.