The Kansas City Chiefs stepped it up a notch at practice on Sunday July 28th by throwing on pads for the first time all year. The cool breezy morning was perfect for Chief players to start getting physical down on the field. Head Coach Andy Reid promised for a tough camp and seemed pleased by his players’ tenacity on the field today.
“They banged around for a little bit, and I thought they traded back and fourth, offence and defense. All in all I thought it was a good day. A lot of room for improvement, so we’ll go back and look at the tape and the guys will continue to work to get better, but there sure were a lot of good things today.”
On the other side of things Linebacker Derrick Johnson wants to see more from the defensive side of the ball. The seven year veteran is looked up to a the leader on defense and as the leader he wants to make sure his defense is playing up to their potential.
“I’m a little hard on the defense, we didn’t have our best game today but we did some good things. Usually the defense is ahead of the offense by this time but I think we did good on a lot of things. We’re a little rusty out there on some things. Its one of those things that you go back to the meeting room and watch it all day and come back tomorrow and correct it.”
Aside from putting pads on for the first time today, the big news for the Kansas City Chiefs was that wide receiver Dwayne Bowe participated in his first practice today. The pro-bowler had not practice all week due what was described as a “chest virus”. He had full pads on at practice today and seemed liked he was ready to get back into the swing of things as he participated in in “every rep besides 10.”
“I don’t know quite what it was, I know I had an infection in my chest and my lungs were tight. It’s getting cleared up by the doctors, so I’m ready to go. I’m about 90 percent. I went every rep besides about 10, and I’m feeling good and ready to go.”
This is important for Kansas City fans as Dwayne Bowe plays an intricate part in their offense and hopes to be one of Alex Smith’s go to guys this season.
Notable players for camp today include Chase Daniels who got many second team snaps and was also seen holding for the kicker. When asked if as a quarterback should he hold or not, he replied saying, “I think it’s a good thing, when you put a quarterback out there who’s been there, they’re automatically a front-runner for something like that. I think it works to our advantage sometimes.”
Rookie running back Knile Davis also looked good on the field today as he broke a couple of runs through the defense in 11v11’s. Number one overall pick Eric Fisher was put to the test today as he saw his first glimpses of blitz packages in the NFL during practice. Fisher seems to be getting a hold of things and is “working his tail off to get it all down.”
Coach Andy Reid expects practices to get more and more physical as the days go on. Fans in attendance were excited to see the players finally with pads on as the football season is begging to look like it is inching closer and closer. I am sure many Chiefs fans are in agreement with what Derrick Johnson had to say in his closing statements to the media today.
“Things are looking up for the Chiefs right now.”
