Kansas City Chiefs: Six prospects to avoid in the 2021 NFL Draft
By John McCarty
Draft Prospects for KC Chiefs to Avoid – Kadarius Toney, WR (Florida)
Kadarius Toney has been a popular name for Chiefs fans to discuss when it comes to potential first-round draft picks, and for good reason. He’s fast, returns punts, and looks fun on highlight tapes. However, despite those things, using a first-round pick on the Florida receiver would be a poor decision for the Chiefs.
A popular, albeit incorrect, narrative about the Chiefs and their receivers is they like small and fast. The small part is absolutely false and the fast part is somewhat false. Other than Tyreek Hill, no receiver on the depth chart is under six feet tall.
While the Chiefs like ‘fast’, what they really want are receivers able to separate. By that, receivers with quickness and an ability to run good pass routes are more important than simply being fast.
Toney reminds me of former Chief De’Anthony Thomas, and that’s okay, as Thomas has hung around the NFL for a while (he spent 2020 with the Ravens). If the Chiefs didn’t have Hill and if they didn’t have Mecole Hardman, I would better understand the idea of Toney.
However, Toney doesn’t do things on the field that separates him from what others already on the team can do. The Chiefs’ overt interest in Steelers free-agent wide receiver JuJu Smith-Schuster tells me, if the Chiefs do choose a receiver early, it’s going to be a taller target (maybe Terrace Marshall of LSU).