Kansas City Chiefs 53-Man Roster Projection
By 3 p.m. Arrowhead Time Saturday, every NFL team has to cut its roster down to 53 players ahead of the 2020 season's opening week.
What will the Kansas City Chiefs' final roster look like without a single player taking a preseason snap?
On today's episode of Roughing the Kicker, we discuss just that.
Arrowhead Report's Tucker Franklin and I dove into a few Chiefs roster scenarios, listed some players who may be on the outside looking in, as well as discussing how not having a preseason may have cost certain players spots on the Week 1 roster.
In an offseason that's been impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic, teams that made lots of offseason changes have the deck stacked against them. Luckily for the Chiefs, they aren't one of those teams.
You've probably heard it before, but Kansas City was returning 20 of its 22 starters from Super Bowl LIV before Laurent Duvernay-Tardif and Damien Williams opted out, as KC still brings back 18 of 22. Additionally, several players have signed long-term contracts and the team's staff remained unchanged.
This is tremendous news, especially after such a unique offseason. Plenty of familiar faces will take the field this year, but what about potential newcomers? I broke all of that down in my 53-man roster prediction.
My prediction is very similar to that of Arrowhead Report's Joshua Brisco. In fact, only a few changes were made between the two lists. Week 1 starters are in bold, and links lead to player-specific stories already published on the site.
Offense:
QB (3): Patrick Mahomes (Matt Moore, Chad Henne)
RB (4): Clyde Edwards-Helaire (Darrel Williams, Darwin Thompson, DeAndre Washington)
FB (1): Anthony Sherman
WR (6): Tyreek Hill, Sammy Watkins, Mecole Hardman (Demarcus Robinson, Byron Pringle, Marcus Kemp)
TE (3): Travis Kelce (Ricky Seals-Jones, Nick Keizer)
OL (10): Eric Fisher, Kelechi Osemele, Austin Reiter, Andrew Wylie, Mitchell Schwartz (Mike Remmers, Martinas Rankin*, Daniel Kilgore, Nick Allegretti, Yasir Durant)
Defense:
DE (6): Frank Clark, Alex Okafor (Tanoh Kpassagnon, Breeland Speaks, Taco Charlton, Mike Danna)
DT (4): Chris Jones, Derrick Nnadi (Mike Pennel*, Khalen Saunders)
LB (5): Anthony Hitchens, Damien Wilson, Ben Niemann (Willie Gay Jr., Dorian O'Daniel)
CB (6): Charvarius Ward, Bashaud Breeland*, Rashad Fenton (L’Jarius Sneed, Antonio Hamilton, BoPete Keyes)
S (5): Tyrann Mathieu, Juan Thornhill (Daniel Sorensen, Armani Watts, Tedric Thompson)
Specialists:
K (1): Harrison Butker
P (1): Tommy Townsend
LS (1): James Winchester
*Breeland and Pennel will begin the season on suspensions, and Rankin will likely begin the season on the Physically Unable to Perform list, meaning he will miss at least the first six games. That is why there are 56 names, rather than 53.
There were certainly some tough decisions made here, but I tried my best to put on my executive and/or coach hats for the final cut. Sorry, Jody Fortson.
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