Voice of the Fan

Open your ears! You’re about to hear the Voice of the Fan. This week three lucky members of our Warpaint Illustrated.com forums voice their opinion on the Chiefs' wide receivers, defensive end Tamba Hali and the KC’s salary cap situation. Listen up!

True or False: The Chiefs will find the consistent, complementary wide receiver threat to Dwayne Bowe among Jeff Webb, Devard Darling, Bobby Sippio and Will Franklin.

I believe that out of all of these choices, "The Helicopter" (Editor’s note: Will Franklin) will be the most effective wide receiver. In watching him play at Missouri, he showed flashes of brilliance. He made some ESPN-type catches and showed his speed on a regular basis.

Honestly, his results at the combine definitely surprised me. I mean, a 4.3 40-yard dash? That is amazing. The reason why he will be the best complement to Bowe is because he can stretch the field. One thing this team has been missing for years is a burner.

Franklin will be able to get out in the open, draw looks from the safeties and open up the middle for Bowe and Gonzalez. This kid has hands and speed; that is a deadly combination in any realm of football.


True or False: Tamba Hali's move to right defensive end will yield fruit. He's capable of beating left tackles on passing downs on a consistent basis, and is also capable of holding his own against the run on the right side.

Tamba is a good complementary player at right defensive end, but the better left tackles will get the best of him. The positive thing is Glenn Dorsey will command most of the double teams, but that doesn't make Tamba a better right defensive end. It just gives him more of an opportunity than Jared Allen had.

Dorsey will make Tamba look better than he did last year, but if Allen would have had Dorsey beside him last year, he might have set the NFL record for sacks. I look for Brian Johnston to start at right defensive end by mid season. At that time, Tamba will move back to his original position, which isn't a bad thing. Tamba needs to step it up on his run defense.


True or False: The fact that the Chiefs are $36.5 million dollars under the salary cap - giving them more cap room than any other NFL club at the moment - is a good thing.

This is a good thing right now because we will have the cap space and money to allocate to the good players going into their second contracts, or re-sign the players who deserve bigger contracts. I don't think Herm Edwards wants Carl Peterson to bring in older players who will blow up our cap again. He wants to develop within the organization and pay fat contracts to players he drafted who will take their game to a higher level.

Put it this way - if Croyle has a Pro Bowl year he is going to get a fat contract extension. If Derrick Johnson has a breakout year, count on him seeking a fat contract extension. I am not going to go through the entire roster, but there is money that’s already spent, even if we don't know where it is going yet.