"The whole thing looks so silly now. All this talk about Matt Cassel and nobody had the right answer. How could they?

You remember the talk. He needs to improve his footwork. He needs to be better on his secondary reads. He needs to throw a better deep ball or show more emotion or stop panicking in the pocket. On and on and on.

So much talk about how Cassel could get Kansas City behind him, to embrace him, to look past a light background and $63 million contract and truly believe in a starting quarterback for the first time since at least Trent Green and maybe even Joe Montana.

Turns out everyone had it wrong. Cassel didn't need to do any of those things. He just needed to have an organ removed before the San Diego game.

Who knew emergency surgery could be a good career move? But Cassel's return from an appendectomy - possibly today - will be remembered as the turning point in how Kansas City feels about him."