Kansas City Chiefs: Why no Chase Litton in second preseason game?

It’s only the preseason, but it would have been nice to have seen more from rookie quarterback Chase Litton in Atlanta. The Marshall signal caller received no playing time against the Falcons.

I know it’s silly to speculate about quarterback playing time in the preseason, but it was a little disheartening not to see Kansas City Chiefs rookie quarterback Chase Litton receive any playing time on Friday night.

Litton, an undrafted rookie out of Marshall, looked good in his first glimpse of NFL action last week at Arrowhead. He went 7 of 13 for 66 yards in that first preseason game and led the offense down the field on the final drive of the game. The Chiefs would come up short, but it wasn’t for lack of effort.

The obvious answer as to why Litton received zero playing time this week was because starting quarterback Patrick Mahomes played the entire first half. That led to Chad Henne playing in the third quarter and Matt McGloin getting the fourth quarter.

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We all know Henne is making the team as the backup quarterback, so the Chiefs really could have yanked him after the touchdown pass to Gehrig Dieter. The true battle here is between McGloin and Litton as the third stringer and it’s hard for Litton to have a fair shake at the job when he isn’t getting a chance to display his talents.

Social media outlets have had fans campaigning for Litton to make the team over McGloin, but that’s no guarantee it’ll happen. McGloin has starting experience, spending four years with the rival Raiders and making seven starts during that stretch.

McGloin has experience and that’s great, but that’s not entirely what a third string quarterback is all about. The Chiefs would be smart to keep Litton around, groom him, and then have him as Mahomes’ backup over the next few years.

Matt Conner of Arrowhead Addict said it best regarding Litton.

"Litton is also a blank slate, an unknown. NFL history is littered with great stories of unknowns emerging from unexpected places. A underappreciated guy lands with a patient team with the right scheme and suddenly he’s developing."

While Litton is an unknown, that’s better than what we’ve seen from McGloin. NFL teams saw McGloin as a quarterback and the result wasn’t good, so here he is… Vying for a third string job. Do we want that guy starting games for the Chiefs should something happen to Mahomes and to Henne? I’d rather have the unknown honestly.

Is Chase Litton better than Matt McGloin now? No, he’s not. He might not ever become good at all, but at least the Chiefs could mold him as best they could. It’s probably too late to do that for McGloin, who’s basically proven himself to be nothing more than a third string guy.

Hopefully Chase Litton actually gets to play in next week’s preseason game because the kid deserves a shot at making the team. It’s too risky putting him on the practice squad, which is why the Chiefs should have him as their number three signal caller.

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