Rookie Review: Kansas City Chiefs draft class proved highly productive

Rashad Fenton

2019 Stats: 12 Tackles, 1 QB Hit, 5 PD, 1 INT

After waiting for more than 100 picks between selections, Veach grabbed cornerback Rashad Fenton out of South Carolina in the sixth round. It left somewhat of a sour taste in your mouth, considering the lack of urgency to attack the cornerback position was quite similar to the previous offseason. In 2018, Veach waited till the sixth round to select Tremon Smith, and he’s no longer on the team.

Fenton was selected in the sixth round because of the apparent development needed for him to succeed. During his time at South Carolina, it was pretty evident that he struggled processing reads quickly in both man and zone coverages. It was also clear that he didn’t have the greatest understanding of route combinations or when breaks were coming leaving easy separation for receivers. He also struggled in his zone drops.

There were still traits to point to from his college tape and see why a team would take a chance on him with a late pick. Similar to Charvarius Ward coming out of college, Fenton thrived in press man coverages where he could get his hands on receivers early and be physical. He had proper hand placement to jam receivers at the line to throw the timing of the route off.

In addition, Fenton’s patient feet and balance were ample reasons for his success in press, much like Ward as well. He flashed ball skills at the college level, but his inability to stay with better route runners often left him behind the catch point, limiting those reps. He was aggressive attacking downhill and willing to get physical to wall off the outside in the run game forcing running backs to cut back inside.

When Kendall Fuller started missing time, Spagnuolo began to run through the limited options he had behind him. There was a short stint of Morris Claiborne rotating in the lineup as the slot corner, but as the season progressed, he would earn more playing time with the defense. Even when Fuller came back, Fenton was still getting some decent reps considering Fuller was transitioning more towards safety later in the season.

Once again, Spagnuolo adjusted his scheme to fit his player’s attributes, which benefitted both Ward and Fenton. Playing his corners at the line of scrimmage, allowing them to be physical instead of asking them to drop into zones consistently paid off. It was pleasantly surprising to see Fenton have the type of success he did from the slot considering he seemed to have stiff hips in college that made it hard to transition vertically with shifty receivers (which is a similar issue that Fuller had and likely one of the reasons Spagnuolo moved him to more of a safety role).

Kansas City will once again need to be looking for more help in the cornerback room in 2020. Outside of Ward and Fenton, the Chiefs don’t have any returning cornerbacks as of right now. Both Ward and Fenton look to be solid corners at the NFL level, but neither is the guy that you want as your true number one corner on the field. They are complementary pieces, which is not a knock at all on either of those guys. Sixth-round picks and undrafted free agents rarely even end up being more than backups and special teams contributors, but both of them found playing time in their rookie seasons. Fenton was another pleasant surprise from the 2019 draft class.