Bitterness of Chiefs, Allen made this trade inevitable

Tuesday night, during the bleak final innings of the Royals’ humiliating 15-1 loss to Cleveland, the Chiefs did something they have never done before in their history. They traded away their best young player in the prime of his career.

Well, that’s one way to keep a Royals blowout out of the news.

The Chiefs traded Jared Allen on Tuesday, and even though it was no secret, even though it had been building for days, in the end, it was still a bit of a shocker. Teams don’t trade away 26-year-old franchise defensive ends. Teams don’t deal players who lead the NFL in sacks despite playing only 14 games. Teams coming off 4-12 seasons don’t trade away their best player.

But the Chiefs did make this trade — Jared Allen to Minnesota for a first-round pick (17th overall) and two third-round picks. It’s a decent haul, I suppose, when you consider that the Chiefs had backed themselves into a corner. There was going to be no long-term deal here between Allen and the Chiefs, no chance. There was way too much animosity between them. There was a lot of bitterness.

And that bitterness was on both sides of the aisle — that’s one part people missed. Yes, Allen felt bitter, he felt betrayed by the organization when the Chiefs did not even try to sign him to a long-term deal last year, when Chiefs president Carl Peterson called him a “young man at risk.”

On the other hand, the Chiefs felt bitter, too. They felt as if they had taken a chance on Allen in the fourth round when there were some character questions; they steered him through some rough times that included two DUIs; they stuck with him and helped him become an NFL star. It’s fair to guess that the Chiefs felt as if Allen should have understood why they wanted to wait and see before offering him a long-term deal.

More than that, though, the Chiefs also bluntly felt as if Allen, while a good player, was not indispensable. When I asked one Chiefs official how the Chiefs possibly could get better without the NFL’s sack leader, he asked back: “How many of those sacks were in the fourth quarter?”

The correct answer to that is zero. When asked what this was supposed to mean — after all, the Chiefs were trailing an awful lot in the fourth quarter, and sack opportunities were rare — the official shrugged and said, “I’m just saying. Zero.”

Yes, this divorce was inevitable. The Chiefs cut the best deal they could. They do now have three pretty high draft picks, and they are pretty excited about that. You get the feeling the Chiefs would drop just about everyone on the team and start over if they had 75 draft choices.

The three draft choices do give them more freedom in this weekend’s draft. Now:

1. They are not forced to reach for an offensive lineman with the fifth pick in the draft. Before this, they seemed to be leaning toward Virginia guard Branden Albert — a player most draft experts see as more of a middle first-round pick. The Chiefs still like Albert a lot, and they might take him. But with 13 picks in the draft, they will more likely take someone more highly rated — like Ohio State defensive end Vernon Gholston or Virginia defensive end Chris Long — and get offensive linemen later.

2. With so many picks, the Chiefs are now in excellent position to trade up if there’s a player they really want. The word is the Chiefs would love a shot at LSU defensive tackle Glenn Dorsey, who is the likely second pick in the draft. A trade like that is now, at least, a possibility.

3. The Chiefs might now consider taking a big chance with the fifth pick — they might even take Boston College quarterback Matt Ryan. There has, according to sources, been a disagreement about Ryan — not about his talent (everyone seems to think he has a chance to be a fine NFL quarterback) but more about whether the Chiefs can afford to take a quarterback so high in the draft when they have so many other needs. Now, the Chiefs have so many draft picks, they might feel as if they can take Ryan and still get what they need at other positions.

Lots to think about. Saturday should be fun for the Chiefs’ scouting department, for coach Herm Edwards (who loves young players), and for fans who love the draft. It will be a wild two days, and the Chiefs’ name will come up again and again and again. With all those picks, the experts might tell us that the Chiefs had the very best draft in the NFL.

Trouble is, the Chiefs aren’t trying to win the draft. They’re trying to win on Sundays. That figures to be harder without one of the most disruptive defensive players in the NFL. Maybe the Chiefs will have a great draft. Maybe they will find a player or two who will make everyone forget Jared Allen. Maybe.

I wouldn’t bet on it. The draft is a crapshoot. Jared Allen is a star. You could argue that the Chiefs had no choice. But there’s a pretty good chance that Chiefs fans will regret Tuesday night for a long, long time.