Former KC Chiefs QB Matt Cassel Returns to Arrowhead

By Leigh Oleszczak | Aug 23, 2014

The KC Chiefs take on the Minnesota Vikings tonight in their third preseason game of the season. Tonight’s game holds very little importance other than the biggest news ever: Matt Cassel is coming back to Kansas City.

Okay, so not even close to the biggest news ever. In fact, it’s not really even news.

Cassel came to Kansas City in the 2009 offseason in a big trade for the Chiefs. KC was hoping they had finally found their franchise quarterback in Cassel. Not quite though.

Cassel’s first year was just meh. His next year was when he hit it big for the Chiefs. He went 10-5 as a starter (he had to sit out one game) and threw 27 touchdown passes to only seven interceptions. He also rushed for 125 yards during his big year as a Chief. That year the Chiefs won the AFC West and hosted a playoff game for the first time in seven years.

That’s where the fun stopped though. Cassel was extremely up and down during the 2011 season and eventually wound up on the IR. He came back in 2012 to play in a terrible season and the most memorable moment consisted of him getting injured and Chiefs fans cheering.

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To this day, I’m not sure if the fans were cheering at Cassel being hurt, the play that happened previously, or the fact that Cassel getting hurt meant bringing in a different quarterback (which was Brady Quinn… Ugh) and therefore a change for the struggling Chiefs. Maybe it was all three. Regardless though, Kansas City was made to look like a bunch of jackasses for the next few weeks because of the incident.

After the Chiefs had the worst season in 2012, they had the first overall pick in 2013. They also made offseason and free agent moves by getting a new hopeful franchise quarterback in Alex Smith and improving the team and organization as a whole.

There wasn’t room for Matt Cassel in Kansas City anymore and he was released in March 2013. The same day, he signed with the Minnesota Vikings and that’s where he remains still to this day (as if it was such a long time ago).

Last year Cassel backed up former 2011 first round pick Christian Ponder. Ponder struggled so Cassel eventually got the nod to start despite the Vikings eventually signing Josh Freeman as well. Basically it was quarterback hell in Minnesota: Having Christian Ponder, Matt Cassel, and Josh Freeman as your guys under center sounds awful (and that’s coming from someone who wanted Brady Quinn to play over Cassel).

This year Cassel will compete with 2014 first round pick Teddy Bridgewater for the starting job. Cassel is probably going to win the job even though he was named the worst quarterback in the league by Ron Jaworski this summer.

So, how will Arrowhead react to Cassel’s big return? Cheers? Boos? A decent mix? What do you think? Leave your comments below, follow us on Twitter and Like us on Facebook.

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