Given that Steven Nelson’s tenure with the Chiefs is likely over, it’s worth noting that he deserved much more credit than he ever received.
Ninety percent of the digital ink spilled about the Kansas City Chiefs secondary over the last year or more has been tilted toward the negative—and rightfully so. The reality is that defensive coordinator Bob Sutton lost his job for good reason, and it was in the second level and beyond that, the Chiefs looked particularly vulnerable, particularly in the way players were often out of position and the approaches unoriginal when challenged.
The Chiefs were bad and people wrote about how bad they were.
But with the majority of secondary stories spent explaining and/or complaining, that also means that there have likely been a few things overlooked. I would contend one of those things has been Steven Nelson.
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Nelson was a third-round pick of the Chiefs back in the 2015 NFL Draft, part of a pot of gold, er draft class, that John Dorsey bestowed upon the Chiefs that year. Consider this run of names. All-Pro cornerback Marcus Peters in the first round. Starting center Mitch Morse in the second. Wideout Chris Conley and Nelson in the third. Even every single day three pick except one is an active contributor in the NFL four seasons later. Ramik Wilson played all 16 games for the Rams, including the Super Bowl. James O’Shaughnessy started 9 games at tight end for the Jags last year. D.J. Alexander played all year on special teams for the Philadelphia Eagles, and Rakeem Nunez Roches landed further work with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. That’s an ultra-rare hit rate for a draft class.
Perhaps it’s the fact that Nelson was just one of several contributors in the same class that started this whole tendency to overlook his contributions. The Oregon State product stood in the shadow of his fellow draftmate Marcus Peters from the outset. He didn’t put up the same number of turnovers, so the headlines all shifted to the right. He also took a bit longer to get going as the Chiefs were slower to let Nelson garner serious minutes.
In his first season, Nelson played in 12 games but started none. However, he started a full season as a sophomore in the league and showed he belonged next to Peters as a developing player who could more than hold his own. Unfortunately, a preseason injury stunted his development coming into his third season and he was placed on injured reserve after having core muscle surgery, forcing him to miss the first half of the 2017 season.
After coming back, Nelson worked his way back into the lineup and has been a fixture as a starter ever since. In fact, for a team trying to figure out how to bail water at other positions and/or handle the transition after trading Peters to the L.A. Rams, Nelson has been the one player who doesn’t need any tending to. There are no headlines about Nelson. There are no concerns about Nelson. He’s done exactly what the team desired of him in the first place—to grow into a starting caliber cornerback.
What should have drawn attention to Nelson this entire time is the lack of other promising options on the Chiefs during this time. There was the failed attempt to inspire one last run from Darrelle Revis. There was the signing and subsequent release of David Amerson. There was the quick fade exhibited by Orlando Scandrick. Oh yeah, Phillip Gaines, Terrance Mitchell, Kenneth Acker, D.J. White, Keith Reaser, Will Redmond were also bits of proverbial pasta thrown at the wall to solve the Chiefs cornerback woes.
Thank the good Lord above that Kendall Fuller at least worked out.
At this point, it looks as if Nelson is on the outs in K.C. There have been zero overtures made by anyone inside Arrowhead about wanting to keep him (compared to, say, Dee Ford). His own Twitter bio reads “NFL cornerback” instead of K.C. although I cannot say with any certainty that it ever said anything team-specific. The expectation feels like he’s going to price himself out of the red and gold, and everyone involves seems just fine with that.
There’s no reason to make this out to be anything more than that it was. Nelson was never a Pro Bowler or an All-Pro. There’s no signature play to remember him by. He was a starting corner and the Chiefs will figure out a way to replace him with another starting cornerback. However, it’s also true that he did his job well, and that he developed into a very solid pass defender who had 4 interceptions and 15 passes defended just last season in 16 starts. He was a steady defender on a team that lacked hardly any others in the secondary, which makes his performance all the more impressive considering the void he had to fill.
Check out this report from Pro Football Focus in December when analyzing Nelson’s 2018 season:
"The former Oregon State product has played 549 snaps in coverage, which is more than any other defender in the NFL this season. In those coverage snaps, Nelson has been targeted 86 times, which also leads the league. The quarterbacks looking to pick on the Chiefs’ cornerback have not been rewarded thus far; Nelson has allowed a completion percentage of just 50% (fifth-best among cornerbacks with 25 or more targets against) and a passer rating of just 66.4 (seventh-lowest). That has equated to a career-high PFF grade of 76.2, which sits inside the top-20 cornerbacks in the NFL."
He was the kid the family doesn’t have to worry about while the other troubled siblings receive the lion’s share of attention. Suffice it to say, the Chiefs might not fully appreciate what they had in Steven Nelson until he’s gone.