The Kansas City Chiefs were beaten about as soundly as one can be in the Super Bowl in February. The Philadelphia Eagles’ victory ended with a final score of 40-22, but everyone knew it was a wrap when the Birds had gone up 40-6 earlier in the game. Clearly, the Chiefs didn’t have enough to get back to the mountaintop, so the 2025 offseason would be crucial.
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However, they have been conspicuously quiet during the early stages of free agency. In a confusing move, they traded two-time First-Team All-Pro guard Joe Thuney — a strange development considering how bad that unit was on Super Sunday. They gave up 17 pressures for a pressure-to-sack ratio of over 35 percent, which would have led the league by a mile in the regular season.
There is still a litany of quality free agents available, however. And, it can’t be encouraging for Patrick Mahomes to see the Chiefs sitting on their hands after restructuring his deal recently. Dominique Foxworth took it a step further and argued that the best quarterback on the planet is a “victim” of the Chiefs front office’s ineptitude.
When Molly Qerim questioned whether the analyst was really framing Mahomes as a victim, Foxworth fired back with disbelief at her disbelief.
“I watched the Super Bowl. That man looked like a victim to me. I assumed that it was obvious, like the Bears, it was obvious what they had to address. O-line. The Bears went and did it. The Chiefs lost their best o-lineman,” Foxworth said before adding,
“Their guard, who was also their best tackle, left, and the way they answered it was by getting a backup tackle from the 49ers to be… his blind side protection. It does feel like they’ve failed him.”
On top of the Thuney move, they brought in Jaylon Moore on a two-year, $30 million contract, despite the fact that he’s only made 12 starts in his four-year NFL career. As Foxworth pointed out, the Chiefs have been trying everything to fix this issue. It’s been a problem since Super Bowl 55, when the Tampa Bay Buccaneers harassed Mahomes all night long.
They’ve tried turning quality right tackles into left tackles, drafting guys, moving guys around, and now they’re hoping to solve the issue by signing an unproven backup. Not to mention that since Tyreek Hill left after the 2021 season, Mahomes has not had an elite offensive weapon apart from Travis Kelce. And even calling the aging tight end “elite” over the last two years is being generous.
However, Jason McCourty, who won a Super Bowl with the Tom Brady Patriots in 2018, disagrees that the Chiefs have failed their generational QB.
In this era of rising player contracts and salary caps, keeping an entire roster together for several years is far more challenging. The reality is, there will be turnover, and teams will have to watch players leave whom they’d prefer to keep. All you can do is charge it to the game.
“When you’re building a dynasty you’re going to lose players. That’s just the fact of the matter… Tyreek Hill, they watched him walk out of the door. Orlando Brown was another guy. Last year, L’Jarius Sneed left, and we talked about the hole that left in the secondary,” said McCourty.
“All season long we talked about how they need to find a replacement at cornerback. They never did, and this was still a team playing in the Super Bowl. I think part of building this dynasty is you have to find ways. “
McCourty also pointed out that the Chiefs have been able to re-sign some key contributors from last year. Most notably, their other starting guard, Pro Bowler Trey Smith—who is seven years younger than the 32-year-old Thuney. He will be back on the $23 million franchise tag. Leading tackler Nick Bolton has also been brought back on a three-year, $45 million deal.
The Chiefs have made some peculiar moves, but they’ve also made some shrewd ones. To be fair, it’s still early March at the end of the day. There is still plenty of time for K.C. to rectify that offensive line for Patrick Mahomes.
