If you’ve listened to Kansas City sports talk radio today, read the Kansas City Star, or looked at posts from Chiefs fans on Facebook and Twitter, you would believe Chiefs general manager Brett Veach has made the greatest deal in franchise history, better than anything Jack Steadman, Carl Peterson, Scott Pioli and John Dorsey could ever have hoped to accomplish.

The accomplishment is the end of Alex Smith’s tenure as the starting quarterback of the Chiefs.

Last night, a few minutes after I sat down in my hotel room to devour a large ribeye (rare, thank goodness) from Outback on Barry Road, I learned Alex Smith was heading to the Redskins, allowing the Chiefs to save $17 million against the salary cap for the 2018 season. The Redskins sent a third-round draft pick this season to the Chiefs, along with cornerback Kendall Fuller, Washington’s third-round pick in 2016 out of Virginia Tech.

Fuller was very angry to learn he was leaving Washington. Blacksburg is not that far from the nation’s capital, and his family is from Virginia, so I can understand why he would be reluctant to head to Kansas City. Many Redskins ripped the move on Twitter.

Meanwhile, one influential Chief was none too happy Smith was heading east.

All-Pro tight end Travis Kelce tweeted out that Smith was a “class act” and he would be sorely missed.

Chiefs fans are overjoyed Smith is out of Kansas City, even though all Smith, the #1 overall draft choice of the 49ers in 2005 (instead of some guy named Aaron Rodgers) did was lead the NFL in passer rating in 2017. Smith led the Chiefs to back-to-back division championships for the first time in franchise history and the team’s first playoff victory since 1993.

The fans have been clamoring for Patrick Mahomes II, who was selected 10th overall in the 2017 NFL draft after the Chiefs shipped their first round pick in this year’s draft to Buffalo to select the Texas Tech gunslinger, one selection before the Houston Texans took Clemson’s DeShaun Watson, who guided the Tigers to the 2016 national championship.

The Chiefs have one of the worst track records in the NFL of developing their own quarterbacks. Nobody will ever forgive the club for drafting Todd Blackledge seventh overall out of Penn State in 1983 instead of Jim Kelly or Dan Marino. Blackledge could not beat out Bill Kenney, who was plucked off the waiver wire after he couldn’t make it with the Dolphins, and by 1989, Blackledge was not with the Chiefs anymore, replaced by ancient veteran Steve DeBerg.

DeBerg began a trend of the Chiefs picking up the 49ers’ leftovers. Joe Montana, Steve Bono and Elvis Grbac soon followed, and while Kansas City was a consistent winner in the regular season, it only reached the AFC championship game once, in 1993, when Montana’s team beat the Steelers and Oilers in the playoffs before losing in Buffalo, allowing the Bills to go to the Super Bowl for the fourth consecutive year and lose.

The Chiefs drafted Steve Fuller, Brodie Croyle and Tyler Thigpen in later rounds, but none made it big at Arrowhead.

Kansas City’s best quarterback of all-time, Len Dawson, was a Steelers reject. Few people under the age of 55 realize that, since Lenny the Cool has been a Kansas City institution since the Dallas Texans moved to the city in 1963.

The Cardinals have a pretty bad track record, too, but at least two of their best, Jim Hart and Neil Lomax, were home-grown. But since Lomax was forced to retire in the late 1980s with an arthritic hip, the only drafted quarterback to enjoy any success in Arizona was hometown hero Jake Plummer, and I don’t consider him to be that good.

The Redskins have struggled mightily at quarterback since Joe Theismann’s gruesome broken leg in 1985, although that was mitigated by Joe Gibbs coaching Washington to Super Bowl championships in 1987 with Doug Williams and Jay Schroeder, and again in 1991 with Mark Rypien.

Some of the Redskins’ quarterback busts since Theismann have included Heath Shuler, Jason Campbell and Robert Griffin III. Those are just three of the THIRTY-FOUR quarterbacks to start for the Redskins since November 18, 1985, Theismann’s last game.

Many people say the Redskins got fleeced. I say the Redskins got the better end of the deal. He will be a very serviceable signal caller for the next four to five seasons for Jay Gruden and whomever may succeed him until Washington can find a young quarterback it likes, whether it be Baker Mayfield in this year’s draft or someone else.

Kansas City’s hopes now rest on a quarterback who never took a snap from center in Lubbock, who played in a gimmick offense which has no idea how to run the football, and for a school whose track record of developing quarterbacks is awful.

Can you name an NFL quarterback from Texas Tech? If you can’t, join the party.

The most accomplished NFL quarterback to ever emerge from Lubbock may be Billy Joe Tolliver, who was a journeyman throughout the 1990s, gaining the most notoriety with the Chargers and Saints. Kliff Kingsbury, who is the Red Raiders’ current coach, played for Mike Leach and later won a Super Bowl ring serving as Tom Brady’s clipboard holder during the 2003 season.

If Mahomes does anything in the NFL, he will become the greatest Texas Tech QB in history.

But I’m not convinced Mahomes can succeed in a professional offense, where he has to take the snap from center and will have to make check downs and fast reads in order to succeed. He didn’t have to do that nearly as much at Texas Tech, and his mastery of Andy Reid’s complex offense will determine the Chiefs’ fate for the foreseeable future.

Kansas City sports fans got one of their wishes by getting Smith out of town. Now they’re hoping Eric Hosmer will come back to the Royals. If that happens, there may be a parade.