Why the Kansas City Chiefs don’t need a prolific number two wide receiver

The Kansas City Chiefs offense in 2016 isn’t going to be drastically different from the past three seasons. Andy Reid is still calling the plays, Alex Smith is still the quarterback, and has already been mentioned the Chiefs are still going to have a solid defense and a good running game. Therefore, it stands to reason that the number of passing plays isn’t going to be drastically different than the past three years.

The total pass completions for each of those seasons are 333 (2013), 320 (2014), 310 (2015). That’s an average of 321 passes completed per season during the Andy Reid/Alex Smith era in KC. Barring a serious injury to a key player or a complete collapse on defense it is safe to assume that the total completions for the coming season will be in that general area.

Jeremy Maclin had 87 receptions in his first season with the Chiefs. Assuming he stays healthy, a second year of working with Smith should only improve their relationship so let’s bump that 87 up a couple to an even 90 receptions for 2016.

Travis Kelce is in his prime, but let’s say his offseason reality dating show kept him from taking a step forward. We bumped Maclin up a couple, let’s knock a couple off Kelce and give him an even 70 receptions for 2016. We previously said that 60 receptions is a pretty safe estimate for KC’s combined backs. If you add those three together that already gives us 220 receptions. That’s only 100 shy of our expected total for the season.

To get my point across I’m going to make a way to early guess of which wideouts and tight ends make the 53 man roster. Let’s say they keep five more wideouts to go with Maclin and two more tight ends other than Kelce. If you want to keep more than that, fine, but that’s even more players to divide those remaining 100 receptions between.

You can also swap out guys that you think will beat out the players I picked, but that doesn’t really matter for the sake of the receiving totals, which is really what I’m getting at. So here are the remaining receivers and tight ends and reception predictions that add up to the remaining 100 that are available.

Chris Conley – 20
Albert Wilson – 15
Rod Streater – 15
Tyreek Hill – 15
Demarcus Robinson – 5
James O’Shaughnessy – 20
Demetrius Harris – 10

Next: What you want from a second option