One year later, the Chiefs' Turk Wharton decision looks worse than ever

This past season saw the Kansas City Chiefs’ worst defensive line play in the Steve Spagnuolo era, with only 21.5 of their 35 total sacks (61.4%) coming from the defensive line. Those 35 sacks not only ranked fifth-lowest in the league, but they were also the fewest since 2021, when the Chiefs could only muster 31 in the regular season before tacking on five more on the road to Mahomes’ only loss in the AFC Championship Game.

A common face on all of those Chiefs defenses was Tershawn “Turk” Wharton, who Kansas City brought in as an undrafted free agent back in 2020 out of Missouri S&T. And while there wasn’t much buzz about the 6-foot-1, 280-pound defensive end who was born and raised just 230 miles away from Arrowhead Stadium, he made his name known when it counted.

This season was the first year of Wharton’s career that he wasn’t in Kansas City red, and it showed in a multitude of ways. Which makes much of Chiefs Kingdom ponder whether or not GM Brett Veach and Spagnuolo made the right choice letting him walk to Carolina instead of working toward bringing him back over some of the slow, same, underwhelming names they eventually did.

Three (four?) for the price of one

The Chiefs did themselves no favors this year along the defensive line. They finished with some of the worst pressure percentages that Spags has ever had as a coordinator (or coach), and they continually forced a loud sigh out of Chiefs fans everywhere by bringing back aging players like Derrick Nnadi and Mike Pennel.

Back when Wharton’s rookie contract was expiring, it was Veach and the Chiefs who chose to re-sign Mike Danna at a three-year, $24,000,000 price tag instead of looking ahead to Turk’s possible new deal. Since signing that deal, Danna has only accrued 5.5 sacks, with one coming in last year’s postseason and only one coming in his 15 games this season.

Then, this past August, the Chiefs could foresee a pitiful defensive line forming after an offseason filled with nothing-burgers from Veach. So Kansas City decided to swap late-round draft picks in 2027 to bring back Nnadi from the New York Jets’ bench.

Nnadi likely would’ve been demoted to third string or even cut from the Jets if Kansas City didn’t trade for him, and it showed afterward, as Nnadi only racked up 16 tackles, with none for a loss, and zero sacks in 15 games. But Veach wasn’t done wetting the bed with his defensive line additions, grabbing 34-year-old Mike Pennel after he was released from the worst defense in the league (Cincinnati) after eight weeks. Pennel came in to begin his Chiefs return in Week 9 against Buffalo and continued to play every week until Christmas against Denver. In those eight games, Pennel sacked the quarterback… zero times.

If you’re keeping track, that’s one sack between three players that Veach and Spags chose over Wharton. In the same 2025 season that saw those three defensive linemen combine for one sack, Wharton played only nine games for Carolina but racked up two sacks—essentially doubling the return value of three Chiefs.

And if one adds on the return of Charles Omenihu (3.5 sacks, five tackles for loss in 2025) this past season on a one-year, $7,000,000 deal, then perhaps it doesn’t look as terrible. But anyone with some football knowledge can see there has not been a great return on investment on the line.

In total, those four players equaled $14,677,000 on the Chiefs’ books this season, while Wharton signed a three-year, $45 million deal with the Panthers that averages out to $15,000,000 per year.

Turk Wharton has a bright future

When Veach was taking everything in last offseason, looking at the Chiefs’ draft picks and the names already on the roster, surely he factored age into his decisions. But if that were true, there could be an argument made that Wharton was worth the squeeze at then 26 years old instead of taking risks on older players who were observably on the decline.

Pennel (34 years old), Danna (28 years old), Nnadi (29 years old), and Omenihu (28 years old) could all be off the roster this offseason as Kansas City looks to completely revamp and rebuild the defensive line around Chris Jones and George Karlaftis. But if Wharton were still on the roster, he could be one of the few who makes the cut due to still being in his prime and his contract length.

Wharton also could have been signed to a long-term contract after the 2023 season, when he was still making just over $2,000,000 per season. Instead, the Chiefs gave him yet another one-year “prove it” deal that saw him capitalize by setting a new career high with 6.5 sacks in the regular season and two major sacks in the postseason run to Super Bowl 59 against Philadelphia.

The final sack of his Chiefs career came in the AFC Championship against Buffalo late in the fourth quarter, and it certainly secured him a few more million dollars that Carolina was eventually willing to give him.

That sack, as well as the huge 2024–25 season that Wharton had, looks to be just the tip of the iceberg. His future is bright—much brighter than the aging linemen Kansas City employed this year—and Chiefs fans just have to sit and watch his career grow in bright blue instead of red and yellow.