They have a new quarterback and a new middle linebacker. They've released veterans Shaquem Griffin Color Rush Jersey , traded away one of the top cornerbacks in the league, signed wisely in free agency and loaded up on draft picks.
Sounds like a losing franchise trying to turn things around.
Try the two-time and defending AFC West champion Kansas City Chiefs.
The slew of offseason moves began even before free agency, when the Chiefs agreed to trades that sent quarterback Alex Smith to the Redskins and cornerback Marcus Peters to the Rams. But the pace of the dealing has hardly slowed down as the Chiefs remake an aging and expensive roster that was good enough to reach the playoffs last season but not good enough to beat Tennessee in the wild-card round.
That's why they signed wide receiver Sammy Watkins, cornerback David Amerson and middle linebacker Anthony Hitchens, and landed cornerback Kendall Fuller in the trade with Washington.
"We're not trying to win a Super Bowl four years from now. We're going out there and we're trying to win a Super Bowl next year," Chiefs general manager Brett Veach said. "Whether that happens, I don't know, but I know that we're going to do everything we can to put our team in position to do so."
Many teams coming off back-to-back division titles would try to hold on a little longer. And the result would be a slow regression that would ultimately force the team to begin a complete rebuilding job anyway.
Veach, who took over for John Dorsey last summer, took a refreshingly different tack. He went after the trade market, was decisive in his convictions and landed his biggest priorities, even if he may have had to pay a premium to get Watkins and Hitchens in the door.
It was a sign the candid, confident Veach is going to be a far different GM than his predecessors in Kansas City.
"If we have shortcomings," Veach said, "we'll continue to work on those things. Our mindset is at every period to get our team in a position to win a Super Bowl. We have a lot of talent here. It's a lot of young talent, which is exciting for the fans, but we realize there may be some growing pains. But we have some guys that can straight up play football Cheap Lorenzo Carter Jersey , and that's exciting."
There is no doubt an abundance of talent, especially on offense.
Patrick Mahomes II is poised to take over for Smith under center, and he showed flashes of his big arm and gamesmanship in a Week 17 victory over Denver. To ease the transition, the Chiefs added Watkins to what is arguably the best set of skill-position players in the division, headlined by NFL rushing king Kareem Hunt, Pro Bowl tight end Travis Kelce and speedy wide receiver Tyreek Hill.
They also retained one of their own when they brought back bruising fullback Anthony Sherman.
"As a team, we've won a lot of games in the last few years," Mahomes said, "and we're bringing a lot of those guys back. And with the additions that we have added, I feel like we can have a very, very good offense. It's all going to start with how we prepare, especially at my position."
Yes, the Chiefs expected to have a very good offense, just as they did last season. But one of the big challenges this offseason has been to fix a defense that ranked among the worst in the league.
Hitchens was a good first step, and he'll step in to the void created by the release of the aging Derrick Johnson, the franchise's career tackles leader. Amerson and Fuller will help to cover the trade of Peters, and the draft picks netted this offseason will almost certainly be used on defense.
Still Jets Elite Jerseys , the question remains: Is that enough to make an appreciable improvement?
"We've got a great nucleus coming back. We've added some players that are top-notch," Chiefs coach Andy Reid said last week. "We're fired up about this whole thing. I'm not great at standing up and going, 'Hey, here we go!' But I'm ready to roll as we're sitting here in March."
Coaching runs deep in Mike Pettine's family.
Vacations to the Jersey shore as a child gave the Green Bay Packers' defensive coordinator a glimpse of the life. His father, a high school football coach in suburban Philadelphia, took a briefcase to the beach, settled a chair into the sand and went to work.
"I do the same ... But it's a backpack. I'm a little more with the times," Pettine said.
The lessons passed on by dad stay with him to this day.
Mike Pettine Sr., who died in Feburary 2017, was one of the most successful coaches in Pennsylvania prep history. Pettine, 51, is coaching again in the NFL after being hired by head coach Mike McCarthy to oversee the Packers defense. He returned after largely staying out of football following a two-year stint as head coach of the Cleveland Browns, serving as a consultant with Seattle in 2017.
"I thought it was normal for everybody else's dad to carry a briefcase on to the beach," Pettine said after a recent Packers practice. "He always had (football) on his mind, it was always there. If it wasn't direct, it was always kind of lurking. He always had pen and paper close, if an idea popped into his head."
Those ideas often worked.
The elder Pettine won 326 games at Central Bucks West High School and four state titles. He retired in 1999 following a third consecutive unbeaten season.
Pettine played for his father and later served as an assistant coach. He ended up across the field from his father http://www.jetsauthorizedshops.com/authentic-thomas-rawls-jersey , too, after taking the head coaching job at rival North Penn 鈥?matchups that often made Philadelphia-area headlines. Pettine took over a team that went from hovering at about .500 to challenging his father's team for state supremacy.
All five head-to-head meetings went to Dad.
"The headline 'Father knows best' was getting a little bit old," Pettine quipped.
The elder Pettine was a Philadelphia Eagles fan, though he had no qualms about rooting for whatever team that his son was working for as he climbed the NFL coaching ladder. Pettine's first stop in the pros came in 2002 as an assistant with the Baltimore Ravens.
Dad would serve as a consultant. Pettine would send him DVDs to view film. Later, he could watch on an iPad.
"A lot of times he would start the conversations with, 'I know I'm just a high school football coach, however ...,'" Pettine recounted. "He would give us 10 things and they were all dead on. ... He just had a great eye for the game."
A high school coach can sometimes resemble a drill sergeant on the job. The style in the NFL is a bit different. For Pettine, it's about creating an environment where players and coaches work together.
But he admired the way his father adjusted to players in a career that started in the 1960s.
"I thought his strength was his ability to adapt, where he goes from an age of kids where they never questioned authority and by the time he finished that had essentially flipped," he said.
"And I think you have to be able to adapt, and I feel the same way when you're working with NFL players," he said. "I just think it's important to know your audience, understand that you're working with the, trying to help them be successful, which in turn will help you be successful."
Team film sessions at CB West with Pettine Sr., on Mondays after Friday games stick out Bills Game Jerseys , too.
"You would never know (they won) if you sat in on those film sessions 鈥?you would think they lost by 30 when they had won by 30," Pettine said. "But I'm a big believer in there's no better teaching tool than seeing it on film. You paint a picture, you show a guy, 'Hey, this is how it's supposed to look.'"
It was a way that his father held his players accountable, which is also important to Pettine.
"My dad said, 'Stop the projector, turn on the lights. Quick, stand up and explain to your teammates what you were just doing.' Nobody wanted that to happen," Pettine said. "And that's something I've always believed, being honest with your players, being direct, that's by far the best way to go about things."
With one big difference.
"I don't turn on the lights," Pettine said with a laugh.
.
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