As wild as it may be to believe, it's been 10 years since the Kansas City Chiefs used the No. 37 overall pick in the 2016 NFL Draft to select Chris Jones, who, simply put, has become one of the best defensive players in franchise history.
What some may not be aware of, however, is that there were a plethora of people within the organization who wanted to go in a different direction.
Everyone was in agreement that adding help on the defensive line was the move to make with the first pick that year, but not everyone agreed on the player, as the choice ultimately came down to Jones and Robert Nkemdiche. And Nkemdiche apparently had the votes to begin with.
The Chiefs could have ended up with Robert Nkemdiche instead of Chris Jones in the 2016 NFL Draft
In a recent piece from ESPN's Nate Taylor, current Chiefs vice president of player personnel Ryne Nutt recounted the events that led to the team drafting Jones.
At that time, the Kansas City draft room consisted of owner Clark Hunt, head coach Andy Reid, then-general manager John Dorsey, and an all-star cast of future high-level executives that included Nutt, who was an area scout back then, Chris Ballard (Indianapolis Colts GM), Ryan Poles (Chicago Bears GM), Mike Borgonzi (Tennessee Titans GM), Brandt Tilis (Carolina Panthers VP of football operations), and, of course, Brett Veach, who replaced Dorsey as the Chiefs' GM in 2017 and remains in the role to this day.
As the Chiefs originally held the No. 28 overall pick in the first round, they were never going to get the highest-rated defensive tackles on the board that year. But the two names they felt they might be able to get, as mentioned, were Chris Jones, who was coming off a solid season at Mississippi State, and Robert Nkemdiche, who'd earned First-Team All-SEC and Second-Team All-American honors at Ole Miss.
Nutt recalled the meeting leading into Round 1 of the draft and says that while he personally preferred Jones, that was not the overall preference in the room.
"It really came down to Chris and Robert Nkemdiche," Nutt said. "I don't want to go through who said what, but it was a pretty heavy consensus of [people wanting] Robert Nkemdiche.
But after what was apparently a fairly heated debate, it turned out not to matter, as Dorsey decided to trade the team's first-rounder to the San Francisco 49ers in order to secure more overall picks. Ultimately, the Chiefs traded their first- and seventh-round selections (28th, 249th overall) to the Niners in exchange for second-, fourth-, and sixth-round selections (37th,105th, 178th overall).
Near the end of Round 1, the Arizona Cardinals grabbed Nkemdiche at No. 29 overall, and that did not go well at all, as he appeared in just 27 games for the Cards over three seasons, starting only six of them. He played just two games in 2019 for the Miami Dolphins, missed the entire 2020 season, and then played nine games for the Seattle Seahawks in 2021 to close out his NFL career.
He did sign with the Niners in 2022 at the start of training camp but was cut after just three weeks. In 38 total games, Nkemdiche recorded 59 total tackles and 4.5 sacks.
Jones, meanwhile, who, as mentioned, was taken 37th overall, has been one of the best players at his position over the last decade, tallying 339 total tackles and 87.5 sacks, the latter representing the third-most in Chiefs history, en route to earning seven Pro Bowl selections and six total All-Pro nods.
So, yeah, Kansas City made the right call.
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