Pay the Man

Just when I thought the storm of speculation regarding the front office of the Chiefs had blown over, here comes another report that shines a bad light on the team we love.

Rumors are coming out of an Arizona radio station that the Chiefs are refusing to pay former head coach the remainder of his $12 million contract, of which he had a year left. Grammar assassination aside, the tweet Arizona Radio Reporter Mike Jurecki sent out yesterday evening has created waves around the NFL, but none more than in Kansas City, where fans are already knee-deep in shame created by the Kent Babb article published earlier in the month citing Todd Haley saying he thought his phones were bugged by the Chiefs. Arrowhead Anxiety was the name of the article, and it certainly created a lot of anxiety across the fanbase.

Now fans have to deal with this. And unlike a newspaper article that blew over in a week or so, this story might take a little longer. That is because Jurecki said that the reason the Chiefs are refusing to pay Haley the remainder of what he is owed is because the team fired him "for cause."

None of this has been confirmed, and the Chiefs would not oblige with questions, saying that they "have no comment at this time." When things like this come out, however, it usually tends to be true.

"For cause" is a very well-placed legal term that employers can use when justifying a termination. In the business world, it means that an employee did something that was against the best interests of the company. For the Chiefs, it means that the team is claiming Haley did some sort of wrongdoing or breach of contract. If the Chiefs carry through with not paying Haley his money, the only way he can get it is by entering a claim to the league office for it to be resolved (employees forfeit their right to sue when becoming coaches). The catch, however, is that the league office tends to favor the people who pay their bills: the 32 owners of the NFL.

If true, the Chiefs wouldn't be the first team to use the "for cause" reasoning to not pay a former head coach. In 2010, the Broncos contemplated adding cause to the Josh McDaniels firing. Here's what an ESPN article written shortly after the firing said:

"Since the videotaping incident, the team has researched whether it could do just that and fire McDaniels 'for cause' and avoid paying him the balance of his contract, team and league sources told ESPN. The Broncos have sought to clarify with legal counsel and the NFL management council on whether the words of chief operating officer Joe Ellis would hurt the team's case on a "for cause" firing of McDaniels, the sources said. Ellis had stated in a conference call on Nov. 27 that he did not consider the videotaping incident a 'fireable offense.'"

Of course, the Broncos didn't go through with it, but another AFC West team did. That team is the Oakland Raiders. Al Davis first did it with Mike Shanahan in 1989, but the most recent example (and only one I can really think of) came in 2008 when Davis fired then head coach Lane Kiffin.

After Kiffin was fired, Al Davis gave a press conference as a sort of airing of grievences he had with Kiffin, and, in his mind, justified the "for cause" addition to the Kiffin firing. In what has become known as the famous "JaMarcus Russell is a good quarterback, get over it!" speech, Davis said:

"I'm firing him for cause now, I'm not firing him for anything else other than cause ..." [And then Davis began to read from a letter he had written Kiffin] "Over the past months you have made a number of public statements that were highly critical and designed to embarrass and discredit the organization its players and coaches. I left you alone during training camp, the implication when you were doing these things, in the hopes you would cease your immature and destructive campaign. I wanted to make this work. ...

"Your actions are those of a coach looking to make excuses for not winning, rather than of a coach focused on winning. " These ramblings of Davis went on and on for the better part of an hour, but apparently the Raiders had enough grounds, because they won their case against Kiffin and the Raiders did not have to pay him the remaining $3.5 million the contract had originally entitled the "flat-out liar" to.

I don't expect the Chiefs to do a press conference, and for Scott Pioli to read a letter about why Todd Haley had to be fired. That, if it's at all possible, would just make the situation worse. But I would like Scott Pioli and the Chiefs organization to address the situation professionally, and give the fans some closure from the bad situation the front office put us through. 

Do I think it's a coincidence that this report was broken by a radio reporter in Arizona during the same week that Todd Haley was reportedly visiting the Cardinals about an assistant coaching position with the team? No. Do I think that it's a coincidence that this report came out after the allegations in the Kansas City Star? Perhaps. The Chiefs couldn't just now decide that he was fired "for cause" now, they would have had to do that at the time (of course, if Haley's phones were bugged, they could prove Haley was harming the organization. On the other hand, it would be a little awkward to turn in transcripts of conversation by Haley made from his personal cell phone ...). 

How do the Chiefs solve this problem? Pay the man. Make this go away as quickly as possible (if it is true). It kills me a little inside knowing that the Chiefs and Raiders could have a dubious similarity. Even if you think Haley deserved to be fired (which I would disagree with), surely you can't think that taking this to NFL court in light of the recent rumors surrounding Arrowhead is worth it.