It's been a long wait, but the NFL draft is just eight days away. For the Kansas City Chiefs, this draft marks the most essential three-day exercise in the most important offseason of the Patrick Mahomes era since 2022.
Brett Veach made his claim as one of the best general managers in football with that ‘22 class, famously hitting on the team's two first-round picks in CB Trent McDuffie and DE George Karlaftis, and then filling out the roster with multi-year major contributors on day two and three, most notably DBs Bryan Cook and Jaylen Watson, along with LB Leo Chenal.
It can be argued that other than Mahomes’ own individual greatness, those draft picks launched the Chiefs into what is now known as one of the most successful dynasties in the history of the sport. Let’s hope that this year’s crop of rookies can do the same.
Kansas City Needs To Attack Edge Rusher Early and Often in The Draft
It’s clear that edge rusher is the Chiefs' single biggest roster weakness, as they have no legitimate starter opposite Karlaftis, and lack notable depth as well. Here are seven different edge rushers that the Chiefs could pick in each round of the draft.
Round 1 - Rueben Bain Jr. - 21 years old - Miami (FL)
At roughly 6’2”, 265 lbs, Rueben Bain Jr. is a shorter edge rusher but a tank of a human and as violent as they come. He is one solid muscle with arguably the strongest hands in the draft and lightning-quick athleticism to go with it. In three years at Miami (FL), Bain racked up over 20 sacks and 33.5 tackles for loss, showing his ability as a three-down d-lineman, a quality very much coveted by Chiefs defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo.
If Bain were a couple of inches taller and his arm length wasn’t in the first percentile since edges drafted since 2010 (30 ⅞-inches), he’d probably be a top-two pick in this year’s draft. While his arm length is a real concern, given the Chiefs' need at the position and Bains' propensity to play at an elite level in college despite his “T. rex” arms, if he falls to pick nine, it would be a no-brainer for Veach. Bain would immediately provide the Chiefs with an 8-10 sack, three-down edge rusher for years to come.
Round 2 - Gabe Jacas - 21 years old - Illinois
This year’s draft class may be lean in some areas, but edge rusher is certainly not one of them. Sure, a Zion Young or R Mason Thomas could be good picks for the Chiefs at 40, or even if they trade back from pick 29 to acquire more assets. But Gabe Jacas is a guy, I think, who has all the tools, and people are missing it. He’s built similarly to Bain at 6’3” 260 lbs, and scored a 9.59 out of 10 RAS (Relative Athletic Score), in large part thanks to his 33-inch arms and an impressive 1.59-second 10-yard split at the combine.
Jacas played all four years of college at Illinois, breaking out his junior year with eight sacks, and then following it up this past season with 11 sacks and 13.5 TFLs, earning him second-team All-Big Ten honors. Jacas has tremendous play strength and combines speed with power on a consistent basis. He will take some time to develop into a trusted run blocker rather than always being in attack mode. Jacas is nowhere near as twitchy and talented as Bain, but he’d be a nice concession pick if the Chiefs elect to go a different route in round one.
Round 3 - Dani Dennis-Sutton - 22 years old - Penn State
Dennis-Sutton is a prototypical Chiefs edge-rush prospect. At nearly 6’6”, 260 lbs with 33.4-inch arms, Dennis-Sutton scored a 9.93 RAS. In his final two years at PSU, Dennis-Sutton accumulated 17 sacks, 84 total tackles, and six passes defensed. With that kind of year-to-year production paired with his frame and quickness, DDS has shot up draft boards in recent weeks.
He’s big and strong, but he lacks the finer technicalities and details that would make a guy of his size a higher pick. Dennis-Sutton has heavy hands and moves well laterally, allowing him to redirect blocks, but he’s slow to counter when his first move fails. Being so tall, Dennis-Sutton has a tendency to stand too upright, which offensive tackles take advantage of, driving him back from his hips. For a round three prospect, Dennis-Sutton is exactly who the Chiefs could put out there on limited reps and work through the ups and downs. An uber-athletic player who just needs a couple of years of professional coaching and improved flexibility is a guy worth picking at 74.
Round 4 - George Gumbs Jr. - 23 years old - Florida
Gumbs’ physique is coveted in the NFL at a lean 245 lbs and standing at 6’4”, but not typically by the Chiefs. For a day three pick, however, I think Brett Veach and his crew might make an exception. Gumbs took a while to come onto the scene in college, transferring from Northern Illinois after three years of positional changes and finally settling at d-line to play at Florida for two more seasons. His 2024 campaign was his best, playing a full 13 games with 5 sacks and a roughly 4:1 ratio of total tackles to TFL.
Gumbs dealt with injuries last season, but has received a ton of interest from teams during the pre-draft process. What’s impressive about Gumbs is that in his short time at the position, he already has a variety of pass-rush moves, but needs more experience to pair them all together and use one to set up the next. Gumbs is agile with a 41-inch vertical that translates onto the field when trying to leap past tackles to compensate for his lack of strength. If the Chiefs want to take a chance on a guy with little but, so far, largely proven reps, George Gumbs Jr. is the choice.
Round 5 - Mikail Kamara - 24 years old - Indiana
We’re gonna keep the train going with short and sturdy edge prospects with Indiana’s Mikail Kamara. At 6’1”, 260 lbs, Kamara is not a freak show athletically and someone who I would compare heavily to Chiefs 2020, fifth-round pick Mike Danna. Danna gets a bad rap amongst some Chiefs fans for how his last couple of seasons ended, but he came into the league very similar to Kamara. Just quick enough and very technically sound to play all three downs and provide timely sacks and run stuffs.
Kamara transferred after his sophomore season at James Madison to Indiana, and despite the major jump in competition, he piled up 10 sacks and an incredible 15 TFL. This past season, for whatever reason, his sack numbers plummeted to just two, but Kamara still managed to win a lot of his reps and pressure the quarterback 60 times in 16 games. Kamara’s talent and size aren’t overwhelming, but he’s known how to play the position to a tee for four years now, something a lot of day three prospects cannot say.
Round 6 - Patrick Payton - 23 years old - LSU
If Payton had decided not to transfer to LSU after four years at Florida State and just entered last year’s draft, he may have been a late-day two selection. But his lack of production in one year of SEC play has been enough to bump him down multiple rounds. Before a one-sack season in 2025, Payton had won ACC Defensive Rookie of the Year in 2022 and kept improving, totaling 11 sacks and nearly 80 total tackles from 2023-2024.
The fifth-year senior has all the tangibles, standing at 6’5”, 265 lbs, with 33 ½-inch arms and 10-inch hands. But he lacks a pass-rush plan, let alone a repertoire of moves and countermoves. Payton has the propensity to take questionable angles in run defense, but he does do a good job when he knows it’s a pass to quickly set up a chop or rip move to trim the edge and shove the tackle out of his way. Payton had shown flashes before last season, so perhaps Chiefs d-line coach Joe Cullen could reignite some of that fire.
Round 7 - Nyjalik Kelly - 21 years old - UCF
Kelly is such a curveball of a prospect, but for the Chiefs and how they like their edges, he is the perfect, long-term project with some potential pay-off. Kelly started off his college career on the right foot, with Miami (FL), garnering four sacks and showing real promise. But when his playing time suffered in his sophomore season due to injuries and the ascension of the aforementioned Bain Jr., Kelly decided to transfer to UCF in the Big 12. And it has paid off for the most part with 8.5 sacks and nearly 100 tackles in two years.
Where Kelly lacks and why he is projected to go so late is a somewhat non-existent twitchy athleticism and strength. There are reps few and far between that made me do a double-take, as his dreadful 1.70 10-yard split backs this up. Kelly does do a great job of keeping his pads low off the snap, reads the pocket well, and climbs it at a good pace. At 6’5”, 250 lbs, and 35-inch arms, the 21-year-old is exactly the kind of prospect Kansas City likes to swoop up late day three.
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