Kansas City Chiefs: Difficulty in valuation of potential Chris Jones contract

The Kansas City Chiefs face a tough decision with soon to be free agent Chris Jones. What is he worth and what can the Chiefs afford to pay? We attempt to tackle his valuation here.

Perhaps the most difficult decision the Kansas City Chiefs will have to grapple with in this early portion of the offseason is what to do with the defensive tackle Chris Jones and his impending free agency. The decision the Chiefs will need to wrestle with the most is what is the dollar value of Jones and what will he be paid? Does he get Aaron Donald money? What about Fletcher Cox type money?

In doing an analysis, I chose six defensive linemen to compare both performance and contract numbers to try and approximate what exactly Jones may be asking for and what he may have coming in the future.

Three included in my analysis are defensive tackles with Aaron Donald and Fletcher Cox being the two top paid defensive tackles in the league, along with Atlanta Falcons Grady Jarrett. Jarrett was drafted in 2015, a year before Jones and played this past 2019 season on the first year of a new deal.

I also included three other defensive linemen: DeMarcus Lawrence of the Cowboys, Trey Flowers of the Lions and Frank Clark of the Chiefs. All three signed new, big money deals this past offseason.

I compared six statistical categories, all based on the first four seasons of a career: Games played, tackles and tackles for loss per season along with sacks and quarterback hurries per season. Also included was the Pro Football Reference ‘Approximate Value’ averaged over the first four years.

All stats provided come from Pro Football Reference and contract information comes from spotrac.com.

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Aaron Donald: 62 Games, 51 Tackles, 18 TFL, 9.75 Sacks, 27 QB Hits, 15.25 PFR Avg
Grady Jarrett: 61 Games, 44 Tackles, 7 TFL, 3.5 Sacks, 10 QB Hits, 5.5 PFR Avg
Fletcher Cox: 63 Games, 53 Tackles, 7.75 TFL, 5.5 Sacks, 11.5 QB Hits, 9.5 PFR Avg
Frank Clark: 62 Games, 34 Tackles, 8.75 TFL, 8.75 Sacks, 18 QB Hits, 5.75 PFR Avg
Trey Flowers: 46 Games, 41 Tackles, 6.25 TFL, 5.25 Sacks, 14.75 QB Hits, 6.25 PFR Avg
DeMarcus Lawrence: 48 Games, 20.75 Tackles, 8.25 TFL, 5.88 Sacks, 11 QB Hits, 6 PFR Avg
Average: 57 Games, 40.792 Tackles, 9.458 TFL, 6.438 Sacks, 15.375 QB Hits, 8.042 PFR Avg

Now, let’s take a look at Chris Jones’ numbers.

61 Games, 34 Tackles, 9.25 TFL, 8.25 Sacks, 18 QB Hits, 7.5 PFR Avg

To paraphrase, let’s put it like this: This is a comparison of the previously mentioned six linemen to Chris Jones with the statistical difference.

| 6.56% | -19.98% | -2.25% | 21.96% | 14.58% | -7.22% |

If we average out the percentage differences between Chris Jones and the other linemen, we find that Jones grades out 2.28% better than the average of the other linemen. Let’s remember that number, 2.28%

Now, lets take a look at the contracts of those players.

Donald – 6 years, $22.5 million, $86.892 guaranteed
Jarrett – 4 years, $17 million, $42.5 guaranteed
Cox – 6 years, $17.1 million, $63.299 guaranteed
Clark – 5 years, $20.8 million, $62.305 guaranteed
Flowers – 5 years, $18 million, $56 guaranteed
Lawrence – 5 years, $21 million, $65 guaranteed
Average – 5 years, $19.4 million, $62.666 guaranteed

So, if we take the average numbers and the increase in ‘performance’ of Chris Jones in comparison to others, we find a value, based on a five year contract.

5 years $23.823 million/season $76.95 million guaranteed

If we remove Aaron Donald from the comparison as Chris Jones is unlikely to get as much money as Donald and the Donald contract boosts what Jones value appears to be, his value reflects the following. The loss of Donald on here raises Jones’ stats in comparison, but Donald’s contract is so massive it still brings the valuation down.

5 years $21.264 million/season $65.54 million guaranteed

If we take the average of the two numbers perhaps, and at this point, if you’re Chris Jones, this is probably what you are looking for and asking for. If we average the two numbers out, we find the following.

5 years $22.543 million/season $71.24 million guaranteed

So Chiefs fans, seeing the above numbers, does your opinion on keeping or trading away Chris Jones change at all? He certainly will be in for a massive pay day. With a strong performance in the Super Bowl and quality production, it will be a good offseason for Jones.

Next. Six Chiefs to Re-Sign for 2020 Season. dark

Also, I think the Chiefs already know this, as does the representatives for Chris Jones. All season we have heard rumors about Patrick Mahomes and an extension. Have we heard anything about Chris Jones? Not a word. The Chiefs know what they plan to do about the Chris Jones’ contract and all we as fans can do is sit and wait to hear what the decision is.

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