Chiefs roster evaluation: Defensive line brought the pressure in 2020
What actually happened?
The 2019 season started slow for the Kansas City Chiefs defense. Clark was battling through a pinched nerve since training camp that could have kept him out for the first month of the regular season. Instead, Clark played through the injury despite losing feeling in some of his fingers. Fans were outraged, considering they let go of their former star pass rushers to pay his price tag.
Only one sack to his name through the first six games of the season, Clark would sit out for Weeks 8 and 9. Veach spoke in an interview with Chiefs reporter B.J. Kissel about the injury after the season.
"“If you go back to those first three, four, five weeks, I’d say 80 percent of the league in that position wouldn’t have played. But that’s why we got him. He had a deal that he was working through, and it would have been very easy for him to miss a month of the season, but he refused. He went out there every day, grinding through it, played in pain. then once we had that time in the middle of the season for him to get healthy, we saw the same Frank Clark we saw in Seattle.”"
Alex Okafor missed time throughout the season with nagging injuries as well. Just as he was starting to come into his own, Okafor was taken out for the season with a torn pectoral muscle. It was the same injury that sent Emmanuel Ogbah to IR earlier in the season. Jones missed multiple weeks prior to the bye week with a groin injury. He also suffered a calf injury that would bench him for the Divisional Round playoff game against the Houston Texans.
The injuries piled up on the Kansas City Chiefs defensive line throughout the 2019 season. Instead of slowing down, the defensive line put up 35.5 of the team’s 45 sacks, which ranked them 11th in the league. Jones led the group with nine sacks in his first Pro Bowl season. After only having one sack in the first six weeks and missing two games after that, Clark finished the season with eight sacks and 14 quarterback hits.
Kansas City finally got to see Tanoh Kpassagnon get the chance that we had all been waiting for in 2019. He demonstrated the versatility that Spagnuolo saw in him to play both outside and inside along the defensive line. He finished the season playing in all 16 games, eight starts, five sacks, and 11 quarterback hits.
The interior of the defensive line improved in the second half of the year too. Derrick Nnadi played through some nagging injuries, but when he got healthy, he was the brick wall we’ve come to love. Mike Pennel was added midway through the season, adding another tank in the middle of the line. Saunders played earlier than anticipated showing some growing pains first but came into his own later in the year.
In the final six games of the season, the Chiefs defense allowed less than 17 points per game in five games. They continued that momentum into the postseason leading to offenses falling into a stalemate. Kansas City finished 6th in pass defense DVOA, according to Football Outsiders. That type of success wouldn’t have been possible if it wasn’t for the defensive line’s success.