A popular local blogger here in Kansas City, Tony, called me out RE: not being critical in regards to my recent blog post + video blog “Press Access to Chiefs Football”. Good for him. I not only appreciate being called out- I’m going to respond to it directly and update the original blog post. Friends, clients and other bloggers have told me that sometimes I’m not as candid in regards to detailing my experiences. This isn’t intentional. Fact is, I don’t get paid to blog. I don’t get paid for my video blogs either. I do this because I enjoy it. Furthermore, I want to provide my audience the “real” take on things I cover. The stuff you won’t get from traditional media. I certainly am not out there to just make everything seem “happy go lucky”. I discipline myself to post quality content in a perspective that’s real- not influenced by anything other than what my opinion is.

If this means I need to up my game in regards to injecting more critical opinions (good or bad), then I need to do it. I’ve been trying to do this more and more- but it’s not to the level I want it to be. Friends, clients, bloggers and Tony- consider your critiques of my blogging officially heard and action is being taken from here forward.

That said, here is additional information on my experience with the Chiefs I should have originally published with the initial blog post (which will be updated):

• Arrowhead certainly is in the mix of being renovated. That said, the facilities are certainly not high-end or very nice for that matter. The press box has a GREAT view of the field, but it was shocking to see how outdated things were for an organization like the Kansas City Chiefs.

• I was initially really excited to meet Jason Whitlock. Let me stress the word “initially”. First, let me acknowledge that I admire his successes and his ability to get attention with his columns he writes for the Kansas City Star and Fox Sports. But I certainly don’t always agree with everything he writes- BUT I do think he’s good at what he does. My expectations when I pictured Jason Whitlock is that he would be like ESPN’s Stuart Scott- someone with a vibrant upbeat personality who is quick on his feet and provides insightful intellectual commentary. I was wrong. From my observations, Jason Whitlock walks around the press box with arrogance. People had to approach him and he’s hailed as the “cool kid” among his press peers (or at least it appeared that way). When I introduced myself to Jason, I simply asked if he’d be willing to do a video interview during half-time, which he was actually quite receptive and open to. When I asked about his thoughts before halftime- he commented something along the lines of, “the Chiefs will screw this up somehow.” (which given their record, it’d be hard to argue they wouldn’t, and they certainly did by games end). All in all- for me it was a lot of high expectations with a disappointing ending in regards to meeting Jason. The takeaway for me is just because you can write well- it might not necessarily mean you’re an interesting or engaging person in real life.

• When I was there, it angered me observing the waste of paper that was used to print “stats” at the end of each quarter. These are handed out to every member of the press- it’s a sheet that details player and team information. This is 2009 and it would make much more sense for the environment to have a website exclusive to the press or plasma screens to project that information. Furthermore, I observed that most of members of the press threw the paper away without even looking at it.

• While it’s great the Chiefs do have objectives and are engaged with social media- they are certainly in the infancy or adolescence stage of understanding how to leverage it to their full advantage. They are trying to congregate the Chiefs community to their website- this means just getting traffic to their site. However, what they have working against them is the painful obvious; when you have a struggling team with a losing record- it is difficult to keep fans excited or positive about the Chiefs. Which means- traffic their website suffers. Sure responding to chat comments during the game, providing correct credible/verified information to fans and engaging on Twitter with fans seems to be the right strategy …but one could argue that’s just fundamentals when it comes to engagement and presence online the Chiefs should have. It’s the first of many steps the Chiefs website team has left to go in regards to their presence online.

• Throughout the game everyone in the press box experienced connectivity and internet speed issues. You would assume the press would need reliable and fast internet bandwidth since time and connectivity is of the essence for the press. However, this certainly wasn’t the case. It was sorta frustrating even for me who was just updating on Twitter and Facebook.

Sitting the press box was interesting and certainly a perspective I’ve never seen. However, I can’t say it was super exciting. Interesting yes- but not thrilling. The fact is, the press is there to get down to business (as they should be). I was excited at the opportunity and enjoyed it.

All of these comments are my personal opinion. For the most part they’re fairly detailed and perhaps overly critical. However, it’s the truth and real perspective from my point of view. The acceptance of the Chiefs letting me attend the game with press access is noteworthy and telling of their willingness to let a blogger provide a candid view of what it’s actually like behind the scenes. I do want to apologize to my readers for not including this insight in my original blog post- but consider this my ‘make good’ action that has immediate implications of the types of critiques you’ll be seeing in blog posts to come in the future. Everyone’s continued feedback via emails and comments is the only way I’ve been able to evolve as a blogger- for better or worse. Thank you.
–