The Chiefs started hot this season before dropping two in a row. Could a trade before the deadline help get them back on track?
The Kansas City Chiefs started this season off with a bang that rocked the NFL when they demolished the New England Patriots at home on opening night. They went on to have a nice run of being the last undefeated team in the league. Shortly after teams started to expose their weaknesses and the Chiefs have now dropped two in a row going into Monday night football against their division rival Denver Broncos.
Brett Veach has not been shy making moves that he feels can improve the roster; he has acquired two former first-round picks in Reggie Ragland and Cameron Erving to try and shore up two areas the Chiefs lacked. I would not be surprised to see Veach make another move to cover up the holes that have been exposed so far, this season. Let us look at who could be some of his possible targets heading into the week.
Giovani Bernard/Jeremy Hill, Bengals, RBs
I put both guys in the same area since they both come from the same team. Kareem Hunt has been the steal of the 2017 NFL draft posting 100+ yards from scrimmage in all seven games he has played this season. The worry a lot of fans have right now is that we may be riding him too much, and I tend to agree with this assessment.
Charchandrick West has done a good job as a third-down back and as a pass-catching back. He is not someone that we would want to play on first or second down or have to rely on if Hunt gets hurt. Giovani Bernard and or Jeremy Hill could both fill this role. Either would be able to give Hunt a real breather and bring down his carries a bit so he is still fresh come January. The other positive here is that it should not cost us too much to be able to get either of these players, since Joe Mixon has taken on the full workload there in Cincinnati.
Kyle Fuller, Bears, CB
The Chicago Bears took Kyle Fuller in the first round of the 2014 NFL draft. He has accumulated six interceptions and 27 passes defended since over his first two seasons in the league. This is pretty good considering he missed his entire 2016 campaign after having knee surgery prior to the season and not being ready to come back part way through. Since coming back he has played well tallying 35 tackles and eight passes defended through the first seven games this year. Getting Fuller would probably take a lot more than it would to get Maxwell, but it would give us a much younger player that could play opposite Marcus Peters for the foreseeable future.
Malcolm Butler, Patriots, CB
Starting to see a theme here? The Chiefs rank 28th in pass defense and even with Steven Nelson making a return soon we are still one injury away from seeing Phillip Gaines make a continued appearance week in and week out.
This move, in my opinion, is a championship type of move. If you are Brett Veach you only make this type of move if you believe that this year is your Super Bowl year. With the way the offense has played so far, I could see this being the thinking in the building. Malcolm Butler has almost moved this past offseason to the New Orleans Saints in a trade, but the Patriots were unable to make a deal happen. After going and getting the best corner on the free agent market in Stephon Gilmore, they may be even more willing to move Butler.
Patrick Peterson, Cardinals, CB
We have now entered the world of things that will never ever happen, but that we would love to see. Patrick Peterson and Marcus Peters would be like a cheat code on Madden and would make this defense very scary to pass against. Peterson is not going to get a Super Bowl ring on the current Arizona Cardinals team, even though he deserves one. I do not expect to see a blockbuster trade of this caliber made since this is the NFL (a.k.a. the No Fun League), and as aggressive as Veach has been, the value that he would have to give up making this happen would be astronomical. Either way, it is still fun to speculate about and if it does somehow happen we would all have to praise Brett Veach for somehow making this happen.