[Rain Man]

My two cents, and I'll start by saying that I mean no offense against anyone I may be critical of. They were all Chiefs and did their best, so I respect the efforts of everyone in that era even if they didn't produce a lot of success.

The drafts in the 1970s were shockingly bad. Now, there may have been a coaching problem that exacerbated it, but I think there was a lack of talent coming in each year. This meant that we didn't have players learning from veterans, which slowed down development of young players throughout the 80s.

We certainly had some good players, but never to an extent to get critical mass. By position group, I'd suggest the following. Note that I'm not looking up any stats and am just going from memory.

Running backs. We were perpetually weak at running back, despite a few high draft picks (Tony Reed, Jeff Kinney, etc.). Delaney was the only guy who came in strong, and we know what happened there. We had too many years with journeyman lead running backs like Billy Jackson and Ted McKnight and Theotis Brown in a running-heavy era where other teams had guys like Earl Campbell and Walter Payton and Marcus Allen. Okoye arrived late in the 80s but had a short career. Grade F.

Quarterback: Believe it or not, we tried. We spent high draft picks on both Steve Fuller and Todd Blackledge in that era, and both busted. Bill Kenney had a few good years (I disagree with Blowfish on his skill level), but for the most part we had subpar talent here. Grade: D.

Wide Receiver/Tight End: Prior to the Mahomes era, I would have said this group was good. We had a few years with Carlos Carson, Stephone Paige, and Henry Marshall, but the harsh truth is that they were an average receiving corps, or only slightly above average, in their best years. We didn't have perennial stars. Walter White was really promising at tight end, but I think his career ended prematurely. Grade: C.

Offensive Line: We had good players on and off but never a powerful overall unit. Jack Rudnay was a solid but undersized center for a decade. John Alt arrived in the mid-80s, along with Irv Eatman and Mark Adickes from the USFL. But that was late in the 80s. For the most part the offensive line was weak outside of Rudnay. Grade: C-

Special Teams: We were good at finding kickers with Stenerud up to the late 70s and then Lowery in this era, and we had decent punters off and on (e.g., Jim Arnold). Our returners were typically subpar. I remember J.T. Smith being okay. Grade: B+, based mostly on the kickers.

Defensive Backs: This is the one area where we shined. Gary Green was around in the late 70s and maybe early 80s, and Gary Barbaro was a hoss at safety, one of my favorite players ever. Over time we got the Lewis/Ross/Burruss/Cherry group. Grade: A.

Linebackers: This group was really weak from the mid-70s until Derrick Thomas arrived. I remember our leading guys often being guys like Thomas Howard, Charles Jackson, Ken McAlister, and a short burst from Tim Cofield. How many people remember those guys? In a running era, linebackers were important, and we also transitioned to a 3-4 without a lot of linebacker accomplishment. Grade: F.

Defensive Line: For much of this era we had Art Still, who I think is a Hall of Fame snub. If he had gone to a strong team, he'd be a Hall of Fame guy right now. We added Bill Maas, who was pretty good, and Mike Bell, who was okay. We seldom had depth, but it was a reasonably strong unit for much of the 80s. Grade: B+, mostly due to Art Still.

Overall, my take is that we could generally field a good defense, but our linebackers were a weak spot that kept the defense from being strong enough to carry the team. And our offenses were pretty much always below average other than a couple of years of Bill Kenney throwing all over the place. Our special teams were pretty good at the skill spots, but with little offense they were hamstrung.

I blame a lot of poor drafting at offensive skill positions, weak linebackers, and often subpar offensive lines.