Chiefs Preseason: Improvement Showing But The Wins Aren't There

Stop me if you've heard this before: The Kansas City Chiefs are continuing to improve each week.

That's a weekly Todd Haley line but over the last three preseason games, it's true.

In the first preseason game against the Falcons, Matt Cassel and the Chiefs didn't look very good. In fact, they looked really bad. Chiefs first team offense scored no points in that game and generally looked unable to stretch the field.

In the second preseason game, Cassel and the offense had a much improved game. Cassel specifically had his best game of the preseason completing 14-of-19 passes for 125 yards with one touchdown. They only scored that one touchdown but, for the Chiefs, it was an improvement.

In the third preseason game, Cassel had a similar game completing 14-of-23 passes for 85 yards. The yards per completion statistic is a bit of a concern with Cassel but, again, just completing passes is a start for the Chiefs.

Overall on the offense, they're getting better but also far from where they need to be in order to be competitive. Cassel has a nice completion percentage (68%) is nice but he's not getting very many yards with each completion. This is an improving unit but they're probably not going to be the strength of the team.

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Meanwhile, it's the defense that I'm starting to think will be the strength of the team. Despite the offensive additions this offseason -- Charlie Weis, Dexter McCluster and Thomas Jones -- the Chiefs defense is having the best preseason.

In the first preseason game, the defense held the Falcons to three points in the first half. They had no sacks.

In the second preseason game, the defense held the Bucs to ten points in the first half. Again, they had no sacks.

In the third preseason game, the Chiefs defense came alive. They were put in a bad position early when the offense turned the ball inside the 30. Two quick plays and the Eagles scored a touchdown. After that, however, the defense played very tough and didn't allow another Eagles touchdown until 23 seconds left in the fourth quarter. This time they had five sacks.

Overall on the defense, it's starting to come together a little bit. They're far too inconsistent even with their best players (Brandon Flowers) but they have at least demonstrated that they can make stops. The lack of turnovers on the defense is frustrating. If they're going to turn into a team known for defense, they'll have to create more turnovers.

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Bottomline, there are good things to come out of these three preseason games. As a fan, you generally want to focus on those. Things like the running game, Andy Studebaker and, at times, the Chiefs defense have been good. At the same time you can't ignore that they're not scoring a lot of points and they went without a sack in two of the three games.

Winning preseason isn't necessarily important, but I think a team like the Chiefs needs to win this last preseason game to gain some momentum heading into the regular season.