last year, when The Kansas City Chiefs had reached a turning point with Tyrek Hill and decided that his contract extension would be more than they were comfortable dealing with, general manager Brett Fish approached head coach Andy Reid to begin discussions about what they would need in return if they wanted to trade Hill. .
“At one point, I was like, ‘You know, Coach, if we can get by [first-] and a [second-round pick]We should at least think about it.”
The two talked about how a trade can infuse some speed and youth into an aging defense, and not just with the draft picks they’ll earn. The Chiefs will also have the salary cap space needed to allow them to be players in free agency.
Fitch and Reed argued that if the Chiefs worked on their assets properly, they could adequately cover the loss of Hill in the short term, while strengthening and lengthening their window to win championships with Patrick Mahomes as quarterback.
The deal would get even sweeter before Veach and Reid made the decision to send Hill to the Miami Dolphins. The Dolphins’ pitching has evolved from a first-round pick to first, second, and fourth last year and fourth and sixth this year.
“The shots got a little too heavy and the pieces started falling together,” Fitch said. “It got to the point where we said we can see it now, and we see it makes sense.”
The Chiefs won Super Bowl LVII last season, defeating the Philadelphia Eagles for their second championship in four seasons using players they acquired from the Hill trade in the process. Trade could continue to provide the Chiefs this season with draft picks in the fourth and sixth rounds.
The Chiefs have found strong starts in each of those runs in recent years: cornerback Legarius Snead in the fourth in 2020 and guard Trey Smith in the sixth a year later.
The trade could still come back to hurt the Chiefs, who lost two other wide receivers, JuJu Smith-Schuster and Mecole Hardman, to free agency. But in at least a year, the deal has done just as the Chiefs had hoped.
“This trade was a way for us to make it work where we could still be aggressive and chase it [in 2022] But also protect our future. “That amount of snapping and that amount of cover space was something we felt could help us last year and in the future.”
Use the bosses The three picks they had from the Dolphins last year were to draft cornerback Trent McDuffie in the first round and wide receiver Skyy Moore in the second. They sent their fourth round pick to the New England Patriots as part of the move to acquire McDuffie.
McDuffie was an instant starter, filling the hole that had arisen when Charvarius Ward signed a lucrative long-term contract as a free agent with the San Francisco 49ers. Moore had less impact during the regular season, as he caught 22 tackles, eighth on the team. But he got a long punt comeback to set up the game-winning goal in the AFC Championship Game and score in the Super Bowl.
Hill’s trade gave the Chiefs draft picks in each of the first two rounds, a reward for a team that in recent years had been picks at the end of each round. Until last year, the Chiefs didn’t make four draft picks in their first two rounds.
The Chiefs had 10 draft picks in total, turning them into a mostly defensive draft class that featured six players who contributed that side of the ball. Most notable was Macduffie. He selected first-round teammate George Karlaftis, who had six sacks; and seventh-round linebacker Jaylen Watson, who had three interceptions, including one in the AFC Championship game.
The Chiefs in the seventh round also found running back Isiah Pacheco, who scored five touchdowns and led the team in rushing with 830 yards.
The draft picks were only part of what the Chiefs got in the Hill trade. Had they signed him to a contract extension, they would have faced an inauspicious future regarding their salary cap.
Their salary cap commitments to Mahomes swelled from about $7.5 million in 2021 to nearly $36 million last year and about $40 million in 2023. Absorbing The contract Hill signed with the Dolphins initially contained a cap of about 31 A million dollars this year – would have left the chiefs with some hard choices to make.
“Everyone knew to put the cap on,” Fitch said. “Everyone knew what the next two or three years would look like, how many players we would have to cut and how difficult it would be. Everyone understood why we had to do what we did and what was the plan.
“We always like to be players in free agency and then complement that with a great draft. We were kind of looking at a period where we were going to have to sit out in free agency and then maybe not be able to re-sign our young players who were in need of contracts.”
The trade allowed the Chiefs last year to sign in free agency two wide receivers, Smith-Schuster and Marquis Valdes-Scantling, and a young safety in Justin Reed. Their key additions this year were offensive tackle Joanne Taylor and pass forward Charles Omeniho.
Mahmoud was not at first Overjoyed about the plans of Presidents Hill Trade. The two combined for 343 passes, 4,854 yards, and 43 touchdowns in Mahomes’ four seasons as the starting quarterback. Hill was the receiver on one of the most notable plays in Chiefs history, his 44-yard pass reception known as the Jet Chip Wasp that led to a fourth-quarter comeback in Super Bowl LIV’s victory over the 49ers.
Mahomes came on after Veach outlined the plan, which included the additions of Smith-Schuster and Valdes-Scantling and drafting a player like Moore.
“I wanted to keep it [Hill]Certainly, Mahomes said. “They had a plan for that, though. They told me the plan and we’d get these draft picks. We’d go out there and offer some free agent receivers and I think they’ve executed that.”
“We know that in order to continue to be successful in this league we have to keep developing, keep getting better. I always want to be successful this year, but at the same time, I’m here for a long time. If we’re going to spend a long time here, I want to have the chance to win Super Bowls every year.”
Travis Kelsey was also initially skeptical of what Hill’s trade would mean for the Chiefs and for himself. Kelsey and Hill were the Chiefs’ top receivers for six seasons at the time of the trade.
“Yeah, that was a question,” Kelsey said late in the season. “But once you saw how hard the guys work, the attention to detail, how Pat keeps progressing as a quarterback…we’re in a good routine that just keeps getting better. You can feel that from the day we started in May until now.”
The Chiefs ended up leading the NFL in yards and scoring.
The Chiefs appear well-founded for 2023 and beyond. They can, like last year, cover a lot of ground in the draft. They have 10 picks, though only one in each of the first two rounds.
For that, they can thank Hill Trading. The Chiefs continue to succeed because of that deal, not in spite of it.
“Nobody wants to lose Terek,” Fitch said. “He was a great player for us. But if you’re going to do something, trust the process and trust how you’re going to do things and don’t be afraid to commit to a change a year in advance, when you have more ability to make those changes work in terms of long-term planning.”
“You know it’s unequivocally the right thing to do for the organization, just from where we’re at in a short- and long-term perspective. But that doesn’t mean it’s easy. It doesn’t mean you wouldn’t miss the kid and miss Sundays, especially.” It’s one of those hard decisions where you know it’s the right thing to do, but it doesn’t make it any easier.”