As the Kansas City Chiefs wrap up their 2024 draft, there's always time to look ahead to 2025.
All joking aside, this is a valuable part of the process. Take for instance, new Green Bay Packer cornerback Kalen King. In November 2023, you could find him in the first-round of NFL mock drafts. King was coming off a highly productive 2022 as a former top recruit. However, lack of production in 2023 coupled with a nightmarish day against Marvin Harrison Jr. knocked him down to the 7th round in the actual event.
If you're the Packers, you tell yourself that 2023 was just a blip on the radar and you trust the 2022 production. Bet on the upside and year of production. If you're any other team, you can look at 2023 as the real version of him and say that 2022 was the aberration.
Context matters for prospects and seeing their process throughout a draft cycle is incredibly valuable. That means the 2025 draft cycle starts now.
While it seems almost automatic to assume the Chiefs are winning the Super Bowl every year, we're going to assume for this exercise they are picking in the 28-32 range of each round.
Round 1: Jack Sawyer, Edge, Ohio State
At 6'4" 240 lbs, Sawyer is a powerful edge prospect who explodes off the line of scrimmage. Sawyer like a huge chunk of the Ohio State class decided to go back for another season. He would have likely profiled out as a day 2 pick in 2024. His run defense is excellent with 19.5 tackles for loss in his 3 years starting, paired with 14 sacks he's a complete edge prospect. Another year on this trajectory of growth and he could be a high-level first-round pick.
Sawyer would make sense for Kansas City as they will likely be moving on from Charles Omenihu and reaching decision time on George Karlaftis. Having a fifth-year option on Karlaftis makes the timeline there a little bit easier to manage but Sawyer, Anudike-Uzomah, Danna, and Karlaftis is a great edge group for 2025 and remains cost-effective.