Kansas City Chiefs: Six prospects to avoid in the 2021 NFL Draft

Draft Prospects for KC Chiefs to Avoid – Spencer Brown, OT (Northern Iowa)

There is a lot to like about Spencer Brown, who is a big offensive lineman from Northern Iowa. I mentioned that he’s big, but he’s also tall, athletic, and will be on the board when the Chiefs are on the clock with the No. 31 pick.

As far as developmental offensive linemen go, Brown possesses a lot of tools that Chiefs offensive line coach Andy Heck could work with and hopefully mold into the left tackle of the future.

The concerns with Brown, and his potential future with the Chiefs, are threefold.

First, he’s only played right tackle in college. And just as was mentioned previously, while Brown may eventually be able to transition to the left side at the NFL level, draft history tells us it probably won’t happen, and almost assuredly won’t happen in 2021.

Secondly, he didn’t play this past season due to Northern Iowa moving their season to the springtime due to the pandemic. While we don’t hold that against him just as we don’t with Stanford’s Walker Little or Northwestern’s Rashawn Slater, it is a year of in-game development for Brown that was not able to be achieved.

In a normal year, would Brown have spent the 2021 season at left tackle, maybe assuaging the concerns about his ability to move to the left side?

Lastly, having come from Northern Iowa, the transition to the NFL is that much more of a jump, as the athletes are obviously faster and bigger. Often small school players (though not always) need time to ‘come up to speed.’

Combine the jump in competition, the lack of playing in games this past season, and the fact that Brown was a right tackle (which the Chiefs appear to have set for both now and the future) and it’s hard to imagine Brown providing value for the Kansas City Chiefs in 2021.