What Does 1-5 Mean?

For the first time in a shade under a calendar year, the Kansas City Chiefs won a football game. The talk of Kansas City being the worst team in football can be laid to rest for at least a week. Playing Washington was a good litmus test in that regard as the Redskins have now played six straight teams who were previously winless, emerging with a 2-4 record.

Using minimal deductive reasoning skills, one can easily come to the conclusion that the Chiefs are at least the third-worst team in the league - better than the 0-6 Buccaneers and 0-6 Rams, but still slightly behind the Oakland Raiders.

If you've read the first two paragraphs of this and grown angrier by the word, realize that there’s a middle ground between being excited over your first taste of victory as a Chiefs fan in a long, long time, and the reality of what this team still is: pretty darn bad. On one hand, your beloved, rebuilding Chiefs just rode into D.C. and beat an NFC East team, drove the nail a little further into Jim Zorn's coffin and logged the first win of the Todd Haley/Scott Pioli era.

On the other hand, your downtrodden Chiefs limped into Landover, produced zero touchdowns, beat a terrible team, out-witted a head coach on the brink of unemployment, made Albert Haynesworth look like he deserved $200 million and are still 1-5.

There are two different ways you can look at this win - either Haley and Pioli are moving in the right direction and the Chiefs will return to the glory days soon, or the Chiefs are still horrid and beat a horrid team. The truth lies somewhere between the two.

The Chiefs did beat a terrible team in the Redskins, who have been distracted by recent talk of their coach being in owner Daniel Snyder’s dog house. However, earlier this season, the Chiefs lost to a terrible team at home that had its own share of coaching staff and ownership drama in the Raiders.

Matt Cassel and KC’s offense failed to score a single touchdown against the Redskins, which isn't ideal, but coming into Sunday's contest, Washington’s defense ranked fourth in the NFL. Considering that, moving Ryan Succop into field-goal range four times looks slightly more impressive, as do Cassel's zero interceptions and Larry Johnson's 83 rushing yards.

Meanwhile, Kansas City’s defense was stout Sunday, allowing just 265 total yards and no touchdowns. They also forced two turnovers and a safety. However, they allowed Clinton Portis his first 100-yard rushing performance of the season, and Jason Campbell and Todd Collins aren't exactly Pro Bowl candidates.

Don't let the pundits rain on your parade, but don't drink the poisonous kool-aid just yet, either. The Chiefs are a long way from being a good team, Haley is a long way from becoming the next Hank Stram, and Pioli is not yet the next Dick Haley. But the Chiefs are improving, and that should be good enough for now.