Chiefs go big, take LSU defensive tackle Dorsey at No. 5

The Kansas City Chiefs started their big draft with big men. First, they used the fifth overall selection to grab Glenn Dorsey, a 297-pound All-American defensive lineman who helped lead LSU to the national championship.

Then they swapped their 17th pick of the first round to Detroit to inch up two spots and take Virginia offensive lineman Branden Albert, a 316-pounder who can play both tackle and guard.

In the second round, they took aim at a third glaring weakness on a team that finished with a nine-game losing streak and made Virginia Tech cornerback Brandon Flowers the 35th player taken overall.

Besides two slots in the first round, the Detroit trade appeared to cost little. The Chiefs swapped third-round picks with the Lions, going from the overall 66th pick to the 76th, and gave Detroit the extra fifth-round choice they received from Miami as compensation for Trent Green.

"The key to me is we got both players," said Bill Kuharich, the vice president for player personnel. "I never thought in my wildest dreams we'd get the opportunity to get both of those."

The minute Dorsey was drafted, the Chiefs began moving people around on a defensive line which was weakened considerably by the trade of All-Pro defensive end Jared Allen to Minnesota.

Coach Herm Edwards said Allen's spot at right end will be taken by Tamba Hali and veteran tackle Alfonso Boone will shift from tackle to left defensive end.

"We have a lot of different combinations all of a sudden with our linemen that we can actually play," Edwards said.

Nevertheless, Hali's 7 1/2 sacks last year pale in comparison with Allen's NFL-leading 15 1/2. The Chiefs will count heavily on getting quarterback pressure up the middle from Dorsey, who had only seven sacks for LSU last year while playing in a system that rarely unleashed him upfield.

"He was a two-gap a lot and he never got to penetrate," Edwards said. "That's why when you look at his sacks and he only had seven. We're going to let him go. He can just go upfield. He's a very aggressive player, very strong, very athletic."

For much of the season, he was also hobbled with a knee injury. But Chiefs' doctors looked him over twice.

"Our doctors are very comfortable with him now," Chiefs president Carl Peterson said.

Both Dorsey and Albert will be counted on to become instant starters and lay the foundation for a draft that everyone connected with the Chiefs concedes is one of their most important ever.

On the heels of their worst season in 30 years, the Chiefs went into the draft with 13 total picks and six of the first 82.

The trade of Allen, who led the NFL with 15 1/2 sacks, despite sitting out the first two games, turned this into a make-or-break draft for Edwards and the front office.

With dwindling ticket sales and a horrendous 4-12 record in 2007, owner Clark Hunt said he intended to be more involved in team operations and expected the Chiefs not merely to show improvement in 2008, but to compete for the playoffs.

A taxpayer-financed $250 million makeover of aging Arrowhead Stadium will also increase fan pressure on the Hunt family to turn around an organization which hasn't won a playoff game since Joe Montana was quarterback in the 1993 season.

Dorsey, the Southeastern Conference defensive player of the year, also took home the Nagurski Award and Lott Award given to the nation's best defensive player and the Lombardi Award and Outland Trophy as the best lineman. As a senior, he started 13 games, usually at left tackle and was usually double-teamed. Sometimes he even took on three blockers, but still had 69 tackles and seven sacks.

Albert, who didn't take up football until his junior year of high school, will probably be used at tackle.

"Man, I'm ecstatic," he said. "I got drafted with probably the best player in the draft, Glenn Dorsey."

Although he's played mostly guard, he could be shifted to tackle, one of the offensive line jobs wide open in Kansas City.

"I'll be fine at left tackle," he said. "Even though I didn't go where I thought I was going to go, that means they traded up, that means they wanted me. I'm happy I was in demand like that."

Flowers, who had 10 interceptions in his college career, will be expected to lend immediate improvement to a defensive secondary that became perilously old. If he's anything less than a full-time starter as a rookie, it will be a disappointment.

"We thought a couple of teams at the bottom of the first round had targeted him," said Kuharich. "I feel very good that he was there. He's a very physical corner. Really instinctive."