Kansas City Chiefs: Post-Draft 53-Man Roster Prediction
By Shade Piper
Defensive Line
Made the Cut: Frank Clark, Breeland Speaks, Alex Okafor, Emmanuel Ogbah, Tanoh Kpassagnon, Chris Jones, Derrick Nnadi, Justin Hamilton, Khalen Saunders
Notable Snubs: Xavier Williams
When looking through the depth that the Chiefs have on the defensive line it appears to me that the final two or three spots will come down to Ogbah, Hamilton, Kpassagnon, and Williams. The rest have their spots pretty much guaranteed already.
None of these four players are rookies, but Williams and Ogbah get the advantage in the experience category. Hamilton got a little experience last season, but is still relatively inexperienced and Kpassagnon is in that same boat with barely any playing time since the Chiefs took him in the second round of the 2017 draft.
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One might assume the Chiefs would go with the more experienced players, but that’s not necessarily true. With great depth, the experience can become a little less important, so if Ogbah or Williams get outplayed in training camp they could very well lose their spots.
When originally making my roster predictions, I wholeheartedly believed that Kpassagnon wouldn’t make the cut, but in looking at the bubble players mentioned above, it appears that Hamilton and Williams could be redundant. Also, EDGE depth may be more important than interior depth anyways which is mainly why Kpassagnon stays on the roster.
So I took a deeper look and Hamilton vs Williams to determine who should stay and who should go. It is really hard to go with Hamilton over Williams with Williams having more onfield production and being the hometown kid, but Hamilton is younger and cheaper. It could save the Chiefs $2.8 million in a post-June 1st cut of Williams.
On top of being a younger player on a cheaper contract, Hamilton actually finished with a higher PFF grade than Williams. Now, this was in much more limited playing time than Williams, but shows what he could possibly be with more extended playing time.
Both Hamilton and Williams had a pretty good grade, but at 6’2″ and 315 pounds vs 6’2″ and 309 pounds respectively and similar playing styles, the redundancy is easy to see.
This could allow the Chiefs to give the Kpassagnon experiment one more season, but the final two or three spots on the defensive line should be interesting to keep an eye on because it really could go any way.