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2024 NFL season: Buccaneers, Cowboys among most vulnerable reigning division champions | NFL.com
8 - Kansas City Chiefs
AFC West · 2023 record: 11-6
The Chiefs have won the AFC West for eight straight seasons. Patrick Mahomes is still in his 20s. Travis Kelce just signed a contract extension. Andy Reid is the best coach in the game. They drafted Xavier Worthy, the fastest player in the history of the NFL Scouting Combine. Chris Jones is staying put. And they are coming off a Super Bowl season fashioned largely on the back of their superb defense, whose coordinator, Steve Spagnuolo, also received a contract extension. New Chargers coach Jim Harbaugh is a turnaround specialist, and he has the second best quarterback in the division (Justin Herbert). Kansas City has a tough start to the year, hosting the Ravens and Bengals in the first two weeks; plus, the team must deal with the scheduling quirk of playing games on nearly every day of the week. Whatever. The Chiefs are chasing an unprecedented third straight Lombardi Trophy for good reason, and it’s unclear if there is anything the NFL could throw at them that could derail that pursuit. Until further notice, they will be the league’s least vulnerable division champion — and perhaps they will be much more.
Kansas City Chiefs
They’re prepping to rotate all kinds of receivers once again. It’s ultimately worked just fine for Patrick Mahomes and Co. the last two seasons, but with 2023 standout Rashee Rice in legal trouble, their two new speedsters — veteran Marquise Brown and rookie Xavier Worthy — could share valuable reps.
Inside K.C. Chiefs’ Derrick Nnadi’s quest to save shelter dogs | ESPN
DERRICK NNADI HAS sponsored the adoptions of more than 500 dogs in the past four years, many of which did, or could have, fallen into the “at risk” category, meaning they were candidates for euthanasia.
In other words, Nnadi tries to adopt dogs most people don’t want.
There’s a pit bull living in central Iowa that is a Nnadi dog. Matt Zager, who drove three hours to Kansas City to adopt the dog, is a Chiefs fan but was more compelled to take the dog because of a Facebook post he saw about “Lita.”
Zager said the dog was found tied to a fence and dumped off at the shelter. She’d had a few litters of puppies, Zagers said, and he wondered whether someone used her for breeding, and “probably just didn’t want to deal with it anymore.” The dog was on KC Pet Project’s endangered list, he was told, because she wasn’t eating in the kennel and was emaciated.
Adding to Lita’s placement issues, she was “reactive” to female dogs. Zager has an American bulldog named Charlie, and he brought him to Kansas City for a meet and greet with Lita.
“They got along together,” he said, “no issues, no problems. She was what we were looking for. She’s the sweetest thing.”
Ways to Create Cap Space
1. Restructure Jawaan Taylor’s Contract
2. Extend Justin Reid
3. Extend Creed Humphrey
Top Options for 2024 and 2025
The defending champions are gearing up for a three-peat and have a good amount of salary-cap space to make some moves if the opportunity arises.
Of course, it’s always good to know how they can create a bit more if they have to. The Chiefs decided to trade L’Jarius Sneed so they obviously understand that you can’t keep everyone but they have to manage the cap to maximize their historic Super Bowl window.
Two of the biggest ways they could do that come on the offensive line.
Jawaan Taylor’s contract is pretty straightforward as far as NFL pacts go. After getting a discount in the first year, they are on the hook for a $24.7 million cap hit in each of the next three seasons. The guaranteed money mostly runs out by 2026, though.
Best NFL team fits for remaining free agents, trade candidates | ESPN
Donovan Smith, OT
Best team fit: New England Patriots
The Patriots re-signed right tackle Mike Onwenu to a multiyear extension, drafted Penn State tackle Caedan Wallace (who will move to the left side in the pros) in the third round and signed former Steeler Chukwuma Okorafor to a one-year deal. But Smith would provide good competition for the left tackle spot and, at worst, depth. He started for the Chiefs in the Super Bowl last season, and he posted a pass block win rate of 90.8% while allowing six sacks over 438 pass-block reps. New England needs reliable blockers for rookie quarterback Drake Maye, and Smith no doubt would help.
Jim Nantz on Why Andy Reid, KC Chiefs are Probably ‘Not Happy’ With 2024 Schedule Arrowhead Report
Then the conversation moved to the challenges of the Chiefs’ schedule. Eisen noted that the Chiefs are the first team to be scheduled to play six days of the week in one season since the 1927 New York Yankees. (No, not the 1927 baseball Yankees who finished the year 110-44-1 and won the World Series. The 1927 football Yankees who finished 7-8-1.) Eisen noted that NFL teams and coaches generally dislike anything to derail their typical in-season routine, while the Chiefs may not even be able to claim much “routine” in 2024.
“I’m sure Andy Reid is not happy with that schedule,” Nantz said. “Particularly, as you get late in the season, you mentioned it, the Saturday the 21st to have a game against Houston and then to turn around and play on Christmas Day — for the second straight year, by the way, they play on Christmas Day — Tony and I were there for the Raiders at KC on Christmas Day this past season, but then they’ll be at Pittsburgh this year, that’s not gonna be a whole lot of fun. I would think that this is not something that would be ideal for Kansas City. Everybody’s out to get them, they get everybody’s best shot, and you know, it’s all about — particularly late in the year — it’s about recovery time. How do you get your body healthy after all the pounding of months and months of being able to stay upright all that time, and you’ve got... I don’t know, we’ll see. Listen, the stats show that the frequency of injury does not go up with a shorter week. That’s not what I’m talking about, I’m just talking about rest more than anything. Just the rest to be able to be at peak performance. But listen, they’re the Chiefs! They figure it out! They really do. And we’ll be gratefully there to see a lot of those games unfold.”
Carolina Panthers: vs. Chiefs, Week 12
There’s a reason the NFL didn’t schedule this game in Munich. Or more to the point: There’s a reason the Panthers didn’t want to play the Chiefs in Germany. Having the two-time, defending Super Bowl champions in town doesn’t happen very often, and it should be a great atmosphere at Bank of America Stadium. The Chiefs haven’t played in Charlotte since 2016, when Patrick Mahomes was in his final year at Texas Tech and Cam Newton was coming off his MVP season. Devin Funchess, now playing pro basketball in Colombia, caught a touchdown that day. But the Chiefs won 20-17. — Joe Person
Around the NFL
Poyer, who inked a one-year contract with the Dolphins, joined his former teammates over the weekend for Micah Hyde’s annual charity softball game in Buffalo. The safety noted that he didn’t “really get to have a proper sendoff or proper goodbye” after the Bills released him and he signed in Miami in March.
The 33-year-old used Sunday to close the loop but also gave some flowers to his former quarterback, Josh Allen.
“Seven years out here, man,” Poyer said. “I loved every moment of it. Thank you so much for allowing me to grow as a person, as a player. Teammates, coaches, everybody, man, I loved every moment of it. Sorry we couldn’t get it done, but you’ve got the best quarterback in the league. I know that might go viral, but it’s OK. I get to see y’all twice a year. I can’t wait. You guys come down to Miami. I get to come back to Orchard Park one more time.”
New York Jets (All in on Aaron Rodgers)
It was no surprise that the Jets used their first round pick to bolster their offense to aid Aaron Rodgers. But it was a surprise that the Jets used not one, but four of their first five draft picks on the offensive side of the ball.
They started with their left tackle of the future (and potentially their left guard of the 2024 season) in Olu Fashanu, but then added Malachi Corley, an impact perimeter and potentially slot receiver with awesome run after catch ability for Aaron Rodgers, and Braelon Allen and Isaiah Davis in the fourth and fifth rounds to add to their already strong running back room.
Offensive line, receiver and running back were already positions of strength for the year based on their past early draft picks and 2023 and 2024 off-season signings, but it’s clear the Jets both trust their defense and know that all their available assets need to make sure Aaron Rodgers stays healthy and is able to get them to the promised land this season.
In case you missed it on Arrowhead Pride
Chiefs 2024 Schedule: 3-game, 11-day streaks aren’t new; will continue
It wasn’t exactly a news flash. In March, we learned the league planned to play these unusual Wednesday games. We even knew that the teams playing their Week 17 games on Christmas would play their Week 16 games on the previous Saturday. This way, the interval between those games would be the same as between a Sunday and Thursday game.
Just the same, it was shocking to see how the schedule played out for the involved teams.
Along with the Kansas City Chiefs, three other teams — the Baltimore Ravens, Houston Texans and Pittsburgh Steelers — are playing three games from Week 15 through Week 17 over 11 days, including Christmas Day.
But these aren’t the only teams that will play three games over 11 days in 2024.
Six other teams will also have to deal with that kind of streak — and none of them are playing on Christmas: the Chicago Bears (Weeks 15-17), Cincinnati Bengals (Weeks 14-16), Dallas Cowboys (Weeks 11-13), New Orleans Saints (Weeks 5-7), New York Jets (Weeks 1-3) and Seattle Seahawks (Weeks 4-6).
Social media to make you think
As a Chiefs fan, I would love for some of their players to develop some offseason hobbies like this. https://t.co/6eXAk8OkwP
— Matt Conner (@MattConnerAA) May 20, 2024
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