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2018 KC Chiefs Roster Analysis (short version)


KC_Guy

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Folks, I won’t do my annual roster breakdown this year. Given the lack of activity around this place I’m just not sure it’s worth the effort. However, I had a look at the current roster and tried to project it into 2018. You’ll find my considerations below. Concerning the cap: The Chiefs are up against the 2018 limit right now – without any new signings or cap hits from releases. So they’ll have to cut some slack.

I'll provide a depth chart based on these consideration over next few days.

Some explanations:

Must keep” are guys that form the Chiefs’ core group, Rookies on their first contract who seem to develop into at least contributor, and guys who are untouchable due to cap implications.
Keep” are guys I think you’ll have a hard time to find a comparable replacement for considering cap implications to release/trade him and the cost for a new guy.
Release” are guys who need to go – where performance and salary no longer relate or where performance is on a decline.
Trade” are guys where I think the Chiefs can get some revenue for replacable  players while clearing cap space at the same time.

Re-sign are priority free agents the Chiefs should try to keep on their roster. Whether to do so or not of course is a question of money as well. There’s no one on this list I think the Chiefs MUST re-sign at all cost.
“Black” guys are players I don’t really care about. Let them come back to camp and sort it out there.

A few remarks on some individual players (where my idea may not seem that obvious):

Allen Bailey: 8 M$ cap hit next year, free agent thereafter. While he’s a monster physically his impact seems somewhat limited. Wouldn’t mind to take a bit of risk here if the Chiefs can get more cap room and may be a late pick.
Dee Ford: 8.7 M$ cap hit next year. He didn’t really convince me he’s the next coming of Tamba even when healthy. His 5th year option is guaranteed for injury – so I wouldn’t take the risk here.
Darrelle Revis: He just not worth 13.5 M$.
NOT caring about Marcus Peters: I really hate the attitude he displayed this year. He could develop into a locker room cancer. Wouldn't mind if the Chiefs trade him off. If he returns they better make sure he's got his mindset adjusted.
NOT re-signing Dustin Colquitt: He’s one of the best punters in the game, but, looking at the Chiefs’ cap situation,  I’m just not willing to pay 5 M$ a year for a guy who has 6 plays a game or so. I think you can get 91% of his performance for significantly less.

Here’s the roster and my verdict. With the roster moves indicated below the Chiefs end up with approx.. 45 M$ in free cap minus the amount used for the re-signings at the bottom:

Tackles

2018 - 75 Erving, Cameron
2021 - 72 Fisher, Eric
2020 - 71 Schwartz, Mitchell

Guards/Centers

XXXX - 65 Devey, Jordan
2022 - 76 Duvernay-Tardif, Laurent
2019 - 79 Ehinger, Parker
2018 - 61 Morse, Mitch
2018 - 70 Witzmann, Bryan

Quarterbacks

2020 - 15 Mahomes, Patrick II
2018 - 11 Smith, Alex

Running Backs 

XXXX - 31 Hunt, Akeem
2020 - 27 Hunt, Kareem
2018 - 32 Ware, Spencer
2018 - 35 West, Charcandrick

Tight Ends 

XXXX - 82 Charles, Orson
2018 - 84 Harris, Demetrius

2021 - 87 Kelce, Travis

Wide Receivers 

2020 - 80 Chesson, Jehu
2018 - 17 Conley, Chris
2019 - 10 Hill, Tyreek
2019 - 14 Robinson, Demarcus 

Defensive Tackles

XXXX - 74 Hamilton, Justin 

Defensive Ends 

2018 - 97 Bailey, Allen
2019 - 95 Jones, Chris

Linebackers 

2020 - 45 Eligwe, Ukeme
2018 - 55 Ford, Dee
2018 - 91 Hali, Tamba
2020 - 50 Houston, Justin
2018 - 56 Johnson, Derrick
2020 - 92 Kpassagnon, Tanoh
2019 - 52 Nicolas, Dadi Lhomme
2019 - 59 Ragland, Reggie
2018 - 51 Zombo, Frank

Cornerbacks 

2018 - 20 Nelson Steven
2018 - 22 Peters, Marcus
XXXX - 40 Reaser, Keith 
2018 - 24 Revis, Darrelle

Safeties

2022 - 29 Berry, Eric
XXXX - 34 McQuay, Leon III
2019 - 21 Murray, Eric
2019 - 38 Parker, Ron
2020 - 49 Sorensen, Daniel
XXXX - 30 Terrell, Steven

Specialists

XXXX - 7 Butker, Harrison
2021 - 41 Winchester, James

Free Agents

2017 - 73 Fulton, Zach
2017 - 9 Bray, Tyler
2017 - 42 Sherman, Anthony
2017 - 13  Thomas, De'Anthony
2017 - 12 Wilson, Albert
2017 - 96 Logan, Bennie
2017 - 94 Jenkins, Jarvis

2017 - 99 Nunez-Roches, Rakeem
2017 - 57 Pierre-Louis, Kevin
2017 - 48 Smith, Terrance
2017 - 53 Wilson, Ramik
2017 - 25 Acker, Kenneth
2017 - 23 Gaines, Phillip

2017 - 39 Mitchell, Terrance
2017 - 2 Colquitt, Dustin

Practice Squad (Free Agents)

4 Dieter, Gehrig (WR)
43 Atkinson, George (RB)
7 Kemp, Marcus (WR)
24 Redmond, Will (CB)
98 Purcell, Mike (DL)

88 Firkser, Anthony (TE)
64 Gordon, Dillon (OT)
62 Johnson, Kaleb (OG)
54 Holmes, Tyrone (LB)

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Offense

RT - Schwartz
RG - Duvernay-Tardif
OC - Morse, Fulton
LG - Witzmann, Ehinger
LT - Fisher, Erving

  • That's a unit you can work with. Doesn't hurt to add to the OL year in, year out though.

QB - Mahomes II, Bray

They need a veteran backup, minimum.

RB - K. Hunt, Ware, West, A. Hunt
FB - Sherman

  • That unit looks set.

WR - Conley, Robinson
Slot - Wilson
WR - Hill, Chesson

  • Very young, but a nice core

TE - Kelce, D. Harris, Charles

  • I lost faith in drop machine Harris. Kelce needs a serious backup, even if it's only a reliable blocker.

Defense

DE - C. Jones
NT - Hamilton
DE -
Nunez-Roches

  • Very thin, major work needed. I'm not sure re-signing Logan is the solution here, but it's hard to find draft picks ready to take over the nose in the NFL.

WOLB - Kpassagnon, Nicolas
WILB - Pierre-Louis
SILB - RaglandEligwe
SOLB - Houston, Zombo

  • Except for Houston and Zombo a young unit. Needs some depth. Much will depend on Kpass.  

CB - Peters, Reaser
NB - S. Nelson
CB - Mitchell

  • Together with DL and TE the most critical part of the roster. May be a focus area in the draft.

FS - Parker, Murray, McQuay III
SS - Berry, Sorensen, Terrell

  • With Berry back this should be a solid unit.

Specialists

K - Buttker
P -
LS - Winchester

  • Let's find a new punter.
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1 hour ago, jimmydee said:

Again, as usual....love the analysis.  Could take possible exception with a couple, but it wouldn't be significant...so, lets roll. Merry Christmas...D. Hug your bride for me.

Bride's no longer a bride ... :x - for quite a while ...

 

but would be interested in your "exceptions" ...

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lmao...woopsie!!   Time?life does move on my friend. Been there, done that!  Thank God for "mulligans"........Just thinkin DJ for another year with a  "House Friendly Contract", with the possibility of bringing him "In House" in some capacity...coach, talent eval., etc. after next year.   Jus a thought.

 

FYI; " Makers" has some competition.......Woodford Reserve!!    Same cigars tho...no change there.

 

 

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Maybe I'm being a homer, but it's hard to see a lot of holes on the talent side. A more disciplined team would be more effective....

Anyway, CB, MLB, or OLB I think will be the early off-season foci. I do think we keep Logan, but also try to draft an early DL. We have got to figure out how to setup the run. Oline in mid-rounds. Assuming we are gong with a young qb, we need or running game to help open things up. 

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On 12/11/2017 at 3:38 PM, KC_Guy said:

FS - Parker, Murray, McQuay III
SS - Berry, Sorensen, Terrell

  • With Berry back this should be a solid unit.

This group needs serious attention. The only keeper with expectation of improvement is maybe Murray. You're optimistic about Berry too. Lose 1 step or 2? But if anyone can come all the way back, it's Berry. This is a sad group overall.

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I agree with most of this. I want to keep Colquitt though. His contract yearly average is 3.75mil. Hekker is 3.5 and King is 3.3 iirc. Obviously that isn't how it's distributed. But, I think we can extend him to a more team friendly deal. I really think we've been spoiled with him and don't truly appreciate what he does.

Remember, after this year we have 2.6mil in cap space according to Spotrac. However, in 2019, we go up to 69.1mil.

If we cut some high money guys we'll end up with dead money lowering that cap in 2019 (we have 15mil dead money next yer). I think barring trades our team will look pretty similar next year. The key to next year will be trading Alex and getting that 17mil space.

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7 minutes ago, kingseanjohn said:

I agree with most of this. I want to keep Colquitt though. His contract yearly average is 3.75mil. Hekker is 3.5 and King is 3.3 iirc. Obviously that isn't how it's distributed. But, I think we can extend him to a more team friendly deal. I really think we've been spoiled with him and don't truly appreciate what he does.

Remember, after this year we have 2.6mil in cap space according to Spotrac. However, in 2019, we go up to 69.1mil.

If we cut some high money guys we'll end up with dead money lowering that cap in 2019 (we have 15mil dead money next yer). I think barring trades our team will look pretty similar next year. The key to next year will be trading Alex and getting that 17mil space.

Alex, DJ, and Tamba all need to be differences in next years roster for sure.  

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2 minutes ago, samsel23 said:

Alex, DJ, and Tamba all need to be differences in next years roster for sure.  

Alex, no argument there.

DJ is tough. He appears to have lost a step. But he still makes splash plays here and there. I think he'd be good to keep around as depth until 2019 when his contract is up. Keep Ragland and KPL as the starters and let DJ spell KPL.

Tamba is also a tough one for me. He isn't playing much. But he is still being effective in his limited snaps. Also, assuming we don't keep Ford, our OLB depth is bad. Tamba's contract is also up in 2019 and I wouldn't be mad if we kept him as a rotational guy for one more year. But we definitely need to draft another OLB.

Houston-Kpass-Hali-Zombo-Rookie... Still not ideal. But hopefully Kpass continues to improve along with a rookie and then in 2019 we can let Tamba and Zombo walk. Of course, we'd still be down depth. But I can't see us fixing that in one offseason with four draft picks.

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55 minutes ago, kingseanjohn said:

Alex, no argument there.

DJ is tough. He appears to have lost a step. But he still makes splash plays here and there. I think he'd be good to keep around as depth until 2019 when his contract is up. Keep Ragland and KPL as the starters and let DJ spell KPL.

Tamba is also a tough one for me. He isn't playing much. But he is still being effective in his limited snaps. Also, assuming we don't keep Ford, our OLB depth is bad. Tamba's contract is also up in 2019 and I wouldn't be mad if we kept him as a rotational guy for one more year. But we definitely need to draft another OLB.

Houston-Kpass-Hali-Zombo-Rookie... Still not ideal. But hopefully Kpass continues to improve along with a rookie and then in 2019 we can let Tamba and Zombo walk. Of course, we'd still be down depth. But I can't see us fixing that in one offseason with four draft picks.

Tamba and DJ are both making right around 10 Mil next year.   With hardly any dead money.

Cutting both saves 16 Mil.  

Sure you could Extend and push it out another year, but I’m not sure I see the reason when both are clearly declining.  The time to move on should be after this year.

I love both and are 2 all time Chief greats, but unless both want to play for 2-3 a year, they aren’t worth more than that.

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1 hour ago, samsel23 said:

Tamba and DJ are both making right around 10 Mil next year.   With hardly any dead money.

Cutting both saves 16 Mil.  

Sure you could Extend and push it out another year, but I’m not sure I see the reason when both are clearly declining.  The time to move on should be after this year.

I love both and are 2 all time Chief greats, but unless both want to play for 2-3 a year, they aren’t worth more than that.

2018 is the last year of both of their deals. So by waiting another year we don't have any dead money. If we had extra picks next year I'd be for it. But right now we'd be replacing them with UDFA or cheap guys off the street since we don't have the cap to bring anyone in. Yeah we could gain 15mil by cutting them. But outside of KPL, there aren't really any UFA ILB/OLB that I'd like to bring in from what I have seen so far.

But I do agree that their cap hit is way too high. As of right now though, I'd rather ride it one more year with them as veteran leadership/depth. And looking at the UFA class of 2108, there isn't even anyone that I'd want to spend the money on outside of our own few guys. With no cap and no draft picks, we won't have a lot of turnover barring an Alex trade and some cuts.

Maybe it's me wanting to see them retire as being only on one team, which is rare in today's sports. Or it could be that I'm tired of all the dead money and I see that we're finally about to be free from most of it.

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5 hours ago, kingseanjohn said:

Alex, no argument there.

DJ is tough. He appears to have lost a step. But he still makes splash plays here and there. I think he'd be good to keep around as depth until 2019 when his contract is up. Keep Ragland and KPL as the starters and let DJ spell KPL.

Tamba is also a tough one for me. He isn't playing much. But he is still being effective in his limited snaps. Also, assuming we don't keep Ford, our OLB depth is bad. Tamba's contract is also up in 2019 and I wouldn't be mad if we kept him as a rotational guy for one more year. But we definitely need to draft another OLB.

Houston-Kpass-Hali-Zombo-Rookie... Still not ideal. But hopefully Kpass continues to improve along with a rookie and then in 2019 we can let Tamba and Zombo walk. Of course, we'd still be down depth. But I can't see us fixing that in one offseason with four draft picks.

I'd be find spending a roster spot on Tamba and DJ. But not the money. They're both playing rotational or backup snaps right now, so if they stay, they would need to be paid as such. Tamba's playing 20-30 snaps per game. DJ's at about 50-60% of the total game snap count. You need them closer to vet minimum than where they are now in order to keep that kind of on field contribution.

Now they may be open to a pay cut. Which would be worth entertaining. DJ has taken a team friendly financial move before. But that lost cap space hurts more than they help, at this point. It isn't just about free agency. We need to make some cuts just to be able to sign our draft picks.

And I wouldn't worry too much about them playing elsewhere. I honestly think each would probably retire if it came to that.

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