Kansas City, Mo. ? So now Kansas City’s longest losing streak belongs to the Chiefs.

No one is suggesting Dick Vermeil’s NFL team will come anywhere close to the humiliating 19-game skid that the Royals snapped Saturday night with a harrowing 2-1 victory in Oakland.

But they have played two games in the preseason, and they are 0-2, and there are a number of disturbing questions to ask.

“Our offense is still not running right,” Vermeil said after an embarrassing effort by the reserves in the second half led to a 24-17 loss to Arizona.

“We’re better than that, but we didn’t show it tonight. We might not have scored without the pass-interference calls, and that would have been two weeks in a row.”

The first-team offense, after failing to reach the end zone in a loss the week before at Minnesota, did manage a touchdown pass by Trent Green and a field goal by Lawrence Tynes, who probably had the worst week of his professional life.

Three pass-interference calls against Cardinals cornerback David Macklin helped set up Green’s eight-yard TD pass to Samie Parker and Tynes’ field goal.

But Tynes, who was arrested earlier in the week for allegedly punching a bouncer in River Falls, Wis., also missed twice. He already was in Vermeil’s doghouse.

Clearly, place-kicking is a serious concern. Look for the Chiefs to fan out across the land in search of someone better.

“He’s in the tank,” Vermeil said. “You miss two field goals like that – not in the National Football League.”

Yet, there was one Chief whose night was even worse. Backup quarterback Damon Huard was 1-for-12 for 11 yards and two interceptions. One was returned 27 yards for a second-half TD, and the other helped set up Josh McCown’s five-yard scoring pass.

The former backup to Dan Marino in Miami compiled a quarterback rating of 0.0

“I know he’s better than that,” Vermeil said. “A quarterback is only as good as his supporting cast. The second half was not pro football. It was a disguise.”

As many as a half-dozen starters were among the list of 25 players who did not suit up. But the brightest spot was the first-team defense. It did seem improved over its performance of the week before.

It held the first-team offense of the Cardinals without a score, although Kurt Warner did complete a 49-yard touchdown pass over Dexter McCleon that was called back by penalty.

But on the whole, it was an encouraging night for Gunther Cunningham’s revamped and still-developing unit. New safety Sammie Knight got over several times to help on pass plays, something that was painfully lacking last year.

Cunningham also called a number of blitzes, showing the sort of wrinkle not normally exposed in an otherwise meaningless preseason game.

“We thought we started slow in the Minnesota game so we wanted to come out a little bit faster tonight,” said linebacker Kawika Mitchell.

“I think we did that. But we still have some room to improve. Our style of defense is getting after the offense. However, you want to do that. Whether it’s a zone defense or blitzes, we’re going to do that.”

Another encouraging sign was the play of Parker, the second-year wide receiver who was slowed by injury last year. With Macklin getting flagged almost every other play trying to cover him, Parker caught two passes for 14 yards but showed the promise of the speedy receiver the Chiefs have thought he could be.

His first catch set up the TD with 10:32 to go in the first quarter.

“He ran such a good route, that when the back fell down I was just trying to put it on him so he could make a play,” Green said. “When a guy runs a route that well and fools a defense so well, it’s nice to see.”