Three potential cuts for K.C. Chiefs to watch on roster bubbles
By Matt Conner
For the first time in several years, the K.C. Chiefs might not be in a position to make any real waiver claims at the deadline for all NFL teams to submit their roster cuts.
Next Tuesday, the league is going to require all 32 franchises to officially move from 80 players to a final 53, which means an incredible 864 players are suddenly going to hit either free agency or the waiver wire (depending on how much time they’ve already been credited with in their playing history). That’s an overwhelming amount of players by itself, a figure that would fill the complete rosters of over 16 teams and then some.,
Those players come after the 10 players each that NFL teams have already cut thanks to successive deadlines that called for five players cut each—from 90 to 85 and then again to 80 as of last Tuesday. In short, the unemployment line is long for NFL players and front offices have the unenviable task of doing their homework on such a large pool of available players.
In years past, the Chiefs have struck gold at this point. Back when there was a lack of talent at basically every position, John Dorsey would often find starters with these waiver claims or at least several key contributors (e.g. Ron Parker, Jaye Howard, Marcus Cooper). Brett Veach has continued the trend in his time as the team’s general manager with claims like center Austin Reiter or running back LeSean McCoy.
These days, it should be the other way around. the Chiefs have arguable the deepest roster in the NFL—certainly one of the top 3-4. Every team is going to be tuned into the Chiefs roster battles to see who makes it and who does not in order to claim them.
Still if the Chiefs are going to make some potential claims, we thought it would help to look around at some other key roster battles to see who might entice Veach to make a move. All of these are long shots and the Chiefs are at the bottom of any order to actually claim anyone as it is. Still it’s interesting to look around and see who might interest the team.