Kansas City Chiefs: Realistic look at 2019 Chiefs roster

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Tyreek Hill #10 of the Kansas City Chiefs (Photo by Jamie Squire/Getty Images) /

The Kansas City Chiefs are one of the early Super Bowl favorites for next season, but they have plenty of big decisions to make with the roster before the start of next season.

These decisions could make or break the Kansas City Chiefs‘ chances at the Super Bowl next year as well as effecting the future of the franchise.

These decisions mainly revolve around Dee Ford, Chris Jones, Tyreek Hill, Justin Houston, and Eric Berry. In this article I will go over what the roster could look like in 2019 financially and the roster I created with using Over the Cap, as well as talking about the cost of extending Hill and Jones along with franchise tagging Dee Ford.

The Cost of Extending Hill and Jones

Dee Ford is obviously the most urgent contract to work on this summer, but not far behind Ford’s situation is looking at possible contract extensions for Tyreek Hill and Dee Ford, who will be both be unrestricted free agents next summer.

Related Story. Chiefs Need to Give Tyreek Hill a Raise. light

Both players are arguably two of the most important players to the Chiefs on their respective sides of the ball. Letting them go into unrestricted free agency would assuredly be a mistake, but it is also going to be very difficult to extend both this summer and stay under the cap.

Most people seem to be only considering extending one or the other this summer and that might be the most likely scenario, but I am going to look at a scenario where both could be extended this summer. It would be much safer to extend them this year before they hit unrestricted free agency.

It could actually save the Chiefs money in the long run rather than letting both guys get another successful season under their belts and hit the open market with increased values. If the front office can tactically squeeze extensions in on both of them this summer, it would make a lot of sense for the Chiefs.

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After a breakout season for Chris Jones, he is surprisingly still one of the most under appreciated players in the entire league and may have been the biggest Pro Bowl snub of the year. If Jones doesn’t get extended this summer and builds off of an already impressive season to produce an even better year next year, he will likely become unaffordable for the Chiefs next summer.

The Chiefs would be smart to extend him now while he is still flying under the radar a little bit and before his value skyrockets. The Chiefs could give him a contract that averages around $14 million per year and that will be just over the franchise tag amount for a defensive tackle in 2018 according to ESPN’s Kevin Seifert. This would be a very favorable contract for the Chiefs especially as the years progress and he continues to improve.

Tyreek Hill is going to cost a pretty penny whether he is extended now or hits the open market next summer. With Sammy Watkins making $19 million next season in base salary and signing bonuses, Hill will probably want to make around that amount or more.

Hill will be a little trickier than Jones, but if the Chiefs were to go ahead and extend him now, they could structure his contract to where it starts off around the franchise tag amount and then let it increase in value over the next few seasons.

They could come in at around $15 million for the 2019 season, which would be under the current franchise tag amount for the wide receiver position. They could make it a four-year deal that increases in value by two to three million per season and give him a high percentage of guaranteed money.

This would be a bargain for the Chiefs to get him for under the franchise tag amount next season and for Hill a long-term contract with increasing value and a good percentage of guaranteed money could be attractive to him as well.

Those two extensions alone will increase the Chiefs’ salary cap hit about $25 million next season. This might have you thinking “What about Dee Ford?” While this seems to take Dee Ford out of the question, lets take a look at what the Chiefs could do to clear enough space to keep Dee Ford as well.

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