Eleven days before they won their first preseason game of 2012 in front of a home crowd, the Kansas City Chiefs starting left cornerback, Brandon Flowers, injured his left foot at a Tuesday night practice. Then, during the Chiefs preseason home opener against the Arizona Cardinals, Chiefs safety Kendrick Lewis injured his shoulder: the same shoulder that he injured at the end of last season. I guess this is the perfect time to be thankful to the football gods, at least for Lewis, that it’s not the same injury from a year ago. In any case, following the Arizona game, the Chiefs played in the Governor’s Cup against the St. Louis Rams, a game in which the Chiefs were embarrassed 31-17 on the road. Notwithstanding, a day before that sub-par performance against the Rams, their star wide receiver, Dwayne Bowe, finally signed his franchise tender. As it stands, Bowe’s teammates are quite impressed with his physic, and the type of shape that he is in.

These are obvious signs that during the ‘holdout’, Bowe was actually working out and not just sitting in his living-room eating cheese-steak sandwiches watching ESPN.

Then something else happened, a week after Bowe signed his tender, the Kansas City Chiefs most prized possession, Tamba Hali, was being suspended for one game (and two game checks) for violating the NFL’s substance abuse policy. This is not to be confused with the NFL’s Performance Enhancement Drugs policy in which the minimum penalty is a four-game suspension without pay. However, Hali’s faux pas has only cost him one game. Obviously, the culprit in this ‘unique’ case, as the NFL has described the matter, is marijuana. Albeit, Hali has a proven track record as a stand-up guy, and no one can argue that Hali doesn’t put everything that he has on the line when he is out there on the field. He is a decorated football player with a close-to-impeccable record. So for me it’s particularly disturbing when I hear things like Justin Houston and Tamba Hali are now known as the ‘Doobie Brothers’.

Tamba Boimah Hali, the college All-American and first round NFL draft pick, is expected to lose $1.32 million because of this mishap. In spite of all this, football fans from all around have continued to rally behind him. That’s because the fans of the ‘Tamba Hawk’, as he is affectionately know by Chiefs fans, knows what a miraculous story this man has inside of him. Hali is a man lucky to be alive. He’s survived the struggle of all struggles; life and death. He’s survived a civil war, and was surrounded my corruption and turmoil; and he learned all of these things growing up as a child in the war-torn town of Gbargna in Monrovia, Liberia. The Republic of Liberia is slightly larger than the state of Tennessee, USA. In addition to living through such atrocities, Hali would not see his mother for years at a time. Hali, like many foreign athletes that compete in America, is from a different breed. He is focused and driven, and is a man of honor, courage, and commitment. Hali is not of the same fabric as many American born athletes (i.e. Pac-Man Jones, Chad Johnson, Terrell Owens, Larry Johnson).

UPDATE: Shaun Smith is a ‘street free-agent’ after being released by the Tennessee Titans this week, and Crennel has gone on the record to say that he thinks the world of Smith. (hint-hint)

All that being said, this topsy turfy series of events have altered the mood of what was once thought to be a very productive training camp for the Chiefs. Now, Chiefs Nation has been taken aback from the initial excitement and expectations of Chiefs football in 2012. However unfortunate these events may be for the Chiefs, and Tamba and the others, I remain confident that some valuable lessons have been learned, and that the negatives will be turned into positives, especially in the ‘unique’ case of Tamba Hali. I just smiled when Little Tamba replied to these recent allegations by saying, “I apologize to my teammates, the Hunt family, the Kansas City Chiefs organization, and most importantly, our fans. I accept the discipline from the league, and will return week two of the NFL season with a commitment to erase this mistake with my play on the field and my conduct off it.”

Now, let’s go pluck some Falcons out of the sky! Go Chiefs!