Alex Smith quandary: Chiefs must find future QB
By Ryan Tracy
If you came here looking for some Alex Smith bashing, I’m sorry, but there is nothing to see here.
This is just a no-nonsense look at the near future of the quarterback position in Kansas City.
We can put part of the Alex Smith argument to rest. Smith has proven that he can take a team to the playoffs and get a win. He can lead a team on a possible Super Bowl run. The Chiefs roster is coming together. A few key additions and Kansas City is looking at a three-year window to make that run.
That happens to be the length of Alex Smith’s remaining contract. His age and that contract are concerns about whether he’ll be able to stay in Kansas City to complete a run at the Super Bowl. Make no mistake, Alex Smith will quarterback the Kansas City Chiefs in 2016 and give the team a chance to go farther in the postseason.
Beyond that, the future gets fuzzy. If the team retains him after the 2016 season, it could necessitate a restructured contract in order to re-sign Dontari Poe and cover Eric Fisher’s fifth-year option. Otherwise, the team could move on with significant cap savings in 2017 ($9.7M) and 2018 ($17.0M).
In either case, the Chiefs quarterback situation is compounded by the impending loss of Chase Daniel. Daniel has been a trusted backup and performed well when he has been on the field. His age, potential new contract and strong desire to start make his loss virtually assured. That leaves the Chiefs searching for both a reliable backup to step in if Smith were to get injured and one that can grow into their quarterback of the future.
Luckily, there are some options available to John Dorsey. The NFL draft, the quarterbacks already on the roster offer some developmental scenarios.
The overwhelming concern is that the 2016 draft class is lacking top-tier quarterback talent. There may not be a single franchise quarterback in all of the upcoming draft, but there are quarterbacks that can grow into starters.
This week on the CWM podcast, we talked about the potential quarterbacks and the rest of the 2016 draft class with our guests that were at the Shrine Game and Senior Bowl in person. We also preview the Super Bowl and talk Johnny Manziel. Here’s the podcast.
The Draft
While the 2016 draft class may be thin at the top, without many options that can realistically become NFL starters, there are a number of mid-round signal-callers that have the potential to develop given time in an Andy Reid system.
Reid has said in the past that he’d like to draft a quarterback every year. That makes sense for a verbiage-heavy offense like his, where it takes longer to learn the system. When picking in latter half of each round, It also makes it a position that requires some hunting to discover talent that fits the Reid scheme. Their are a few mid-round options that could fit in Kansas City’s as a mobile quarterback, though they will need seasons to develop.
Next: Who are the Contenders for the backup/QBoF spot?