Arrowhead Pride
Chiefs headlines for Saturday, June 14
Looking back, first-team All-Pro center Creed Humphrey called it “a bad day at the office.” And it was, in the same way that the Season 2 finale of “Severance” depicted a bad day at Lumon Industries.
There was no way to expunge the experience from anyone’s memory, or to ignore the obvious: In lieu of a do-over, the line needed a makeover.
To Chiefs coach Andy Reid, a former BYU tackle, the unit’s failure was especially jarring. As Reid told me Thursday after an OTA session, “It caught up to us. (Rushing the passer) was their strength; (stopping it) was not our strength. They took advantage. But look, I take full responsibility. It’s on me to fix it, to get it where it should be. I think we’re getting there.”
For Mahomes’ sake, they’d better be. As he approaches his 30th birthday in September, the transcendent quarterback has already established himself as one of the sport’s all-time greats. However, the three-time Super Bowl champion has also been haunted by what might have been.
NFL draft history proves Chiefs took the right risk on Omarr Norman-Lott | Arrowhead Addict
What does recent history say about the hit rate of late 2nd round defensive tackles?
Obviously, every draft pick is different, but I thought it would be interesting to see what the hit rate is for defensive tackles taken in this same area of the draft to understand what history suggests about Norman-Lott’s chances of making it in the NFL. I did a similar study earlier this week with late first-round tackles and the Chiefs’ first pick, Josh Simmons.
Just like I did with Simmons, I examined the ten draft classes from 2014 to 2023. That’s the ten most recent drafts, excluding 2024 because I think it’s too soon to evaluate whether those players are hits or busts. I then looked specifically at defensive tackles taken within ten picks before and after pick 63 (where Norman-Lott was selected). That range of picks, 53–73, gave me a 21-pick span stretching from the mid-second round to the early third round.
In those ten drafts, I found 18 defensive tackles taken in that pick range. I will state, for transparency’s sake, that I had to make a few judgment calls on what qualifies as a defensive tackle. Some players were listed as defensive ends in the draft because the team selected them to play as 3-4 defensive ends in their system, which most consider to be more of a defensive tackle than an edge player.
Ex-Chiefs OL D.J. Humphries inks new deal with L.A. Rams | Chiefs Wire
Humphries, who joined Kansas City last season after an eight-year stint with the Arizona Cardinals, is an experienced blocker with a Pro Bowl selection on his...
