A Glamour Shot Stuffed with Velveeta by Getty Images.

Brandon Spano
February 3, 2010

From the beginning, Scott Pioli has said that coaching staff decisions start and end at the feet of Todd Haley. You can get fired, hired, demoted or promoted by Haley and he needs no other votes to make any of that happen.

What we have seen so far in the 2010 off-season is nothing short of amazing. Haley was finally able to reel in Romeo Crennel after a year long fishing trip. He was also reached out to one of his mentors, Charlie Weis as soon as he became available and used the Romeo / Weiss connection to convince both of them to join a 4-12 team. “Hey Romeo, you know were talking to Charlie, he’s gonna come aboard and I would love nothing more than to see you guys coaching together again.”Next phone call: “Hey Charlie, you know were talking to Romeo, I think he is really considering joining the club, you know it would be cool for you and him to coach together again.” If you are one of the few who still doesn’t see the significance of these coaches, refer to “The Story Of Romeo and Charli-ette,” an article that we posted a few weeks ago.

OK, so I obviously don’t know if that’s how the phone call sounded, but I bet I wasn’t too far off. Just to show Chiefs fans how far this organization has come and how much more prepared we are right now, than we were last year, consider this. Todd Haley wasn’t even hired yet at this time last year.

The Weis hiring opened up the flood gates for a guy like Bernie Parmalee to sail in. A big time hiring that has been over shadowed by the other big names that we have mentioned so often. Parmalee is a bright mind and in the coaching ranks, a young one too. At 37 years old, Parmalee took over as the Fighting Irish tight ends coach. Taking after his mentor, Charlie Weis, he immediately put his players into position to gain nation wide recognition and awards. John Carlson, who played under Parmalee, was a John Mackey award finalist and was named second team All American by Sports Illustrated in 2006. Carlson was drafted by the Seahawks in 2008 and ended up leading the team in receptions and yards his rookie year. Anthony Fasano, who also played for Parmalee, was named a John Mackey finalist in 2005 and ended up being a second round draft pick by the Dallas Cowboys the following year. Tight ends have been a great concern for the Chiefs after the G.O.A.T went to Atlanta, hopefully new tight ends coach, Bernie Parmalee, can correct that problem right away.

The hiring of Chiefs Hall Of Fame Cornerback, Emmitt Thomas, was the bold exclamation point, in 4o font, that ended this tale of men looking for redemption and belonging, after star studded careers that almost ended in mediocrity. Emmitt Thomas is the Chiefs all time leading interceptor and based on Hall Of Fame standards, one of the thirteen best to ever play in Red and Gold. Charlie Weis had this to say about Haley being able to get coach Thomas on board: “I think Coach Haley has had time to do a lot of due diligence and should be credited to be able to pull a guy like Emmitt Thomas out of his hat, I mean that just doesn?t happen, folks. There?s a lot of due diligence that comes to doing something like that.”

Coach Thomas has a stellar coaching resume to say the least. He was apart of a Redskins staff that won 2 Super bowls in 1988 and 1992. In 2008, Thomas not only went into the Hall Of Fame, but did it with two players that he had coached in Washington, Art Monk and Darell Green. He always specialized in his passion, which is defensive backs, but on December 12th, 2007 as a member of the Falcons staff, he had to step up into one of the hardest and most difficult situations you can ask a coach to step into. That was the day that the spineless, Bobby Petrino, quit on his staff and his team in the middle of the season. Falcons Owner, Arthur Blank had to put somebody in charge that would be able to retain the drive and willingness to win that many people thought would be gone after the franchise had been dumped by it’s head coach. Blank chose Thomas to finish the season as head coach and believe it or not, the Falcons actually won their final game over the Seattle Seahawks. for many players, it was a gift for a coach that would never give up on them like their previous coach did. The following season, Mike Smith was hired and made Emmitt Thomas an assistant head coach. Coach Thomas coached there until this last season when his contract was up.

Now Thomas is back where it all started, this time as the Chiefs defensive backs coach and if Haley had not made this decision, he wouldn’t be. Plain and simple.

Did Pioli have a hand in these signings? Probably. Did he give Haley his opinion and act as a sounding board before any major decisions were made? Sure. But in the end it was Haley’s decision and based purely on what Haley decided to do, this is the staff in place.

Now it is Scott Pioli’s turn to recruit people. In Pioli’s case it will be players instead of coaches. Just like in coach Haley’s situation. Pioli will ask Todd what he thinks and he will bounce ideas off of Haley to help him make decisions. But just as in Haley’s case with the coaches, The final decision on players will come down to Pioli. He knows the cap situation, (or non-cap situation) he knows the contract situations and he knows the Hunt’s financial situation. Just as the credit for the Patriots drafting and rosters went to Pioli, the credit for the Chiefs drafting and final roster talent should also go to Pioli. If Pioli has even close to the type of success in this off-season that Haley has, the Chiefs should be very competitive next year.

If you missed the Charlie Weis story that we posted last month titled: “Charlie Weis Has Been Here Before,” you can find it here.

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