Chiefs College Scout Reflects on Trade for Brashard Smith

The Kansas City Chiefs had a successful draft for the most part, addressing their most prominent areas of need while also taking chances on prospects who could work out very well for them in the future.

This is shown most poignantly by who the Chiefs ended their draft with. In the seventh round, the Chiefs used their pick to draft Brashard Smith from Southern Methodist University. Despite their wide receiver room being settled for next season, the Chiefs didn't let that stop them from taking a chance on a player who has huge upside in catching footballs from Patrick Mahomes.

Ryne Nutt is the Director of Player Personnel/College Scouting for the Chiefs, and he took part in an online press conference where he opened up about what it was like to trade up in the seventh round to take Smith and how all the coaching staff bought into him as a player.

“We knew before the draft that this was a very deep running back class. There were guys that fell into the fourth round that we thought would be gone in the beginning of round three and possibly maybe even two, so we kind of knew it was deep.

We knew Brashard was somebody we liked, kind of in the mid-rounds, but with it being so deep, there was maybe a chance to get him. What happened was, in the fifth, there was a player in, Jeff Bassa, who was there, who was clearly the best player on our board.

That would’ve been the time to take a running back, but when you have another player that is higher on the board, Brett Veach likes to go by, ‘Listen, we’ve worked on this board for eight months, let’s let this thing speak to us.

So, we took the player we had slightly higher in Jeff Bassa, and then it allowed Brett to refocus and say, ‘Okay, I’m going to take a running back now I know who I want.’ We get to the seventh round, and Brett felt like giving up another seventh-round pick to move up was well worth it – I think everybody did – to get the kid that we liked in the mid-rounds. That was kind of the thinking there".

Smith is a running back, but he has immense upside to be primarily a receiving back for the Chiefs' offense. If the Chiefs want to bolster their chances of making it back to the Super Bowl, there are still free agents they should sign to improve their roster.

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