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The Kansas City Chiefs have five picks in the 2020 NFL Draft. Who will be the next wave of players to join the reigning Super Bowl Champs?
If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. The Kansas City Chiefs are rolling with that “run it back” mentality.
After winning Super Bowl LIV on the backs of MVP quarterback Patrick Mahomes and an improved defense, Kansas City is retaining the majority of its starters. The 2020 NFL Draft will be general manager Brett Veach’s chance to add new faces into the fold as the grind for a repeat continues.
The foundational pieces are there. Mahomes, Tyreek Hill, Travis Kelce, Mitchell Schwartz, Chris Jones, Frank Clark, Tyrann Mathieu and others are all some of the best at what they do. Kansas City has a winning formula in place and already boasts a pretty loaded roster. Whatever Veach can add moving forward, though, could be the difference between a short-term winner and a budding dynasty.
As things stand, the Chiefs have just five picks to work with in this year’s draft. That’s a direct result of Veach’s aggressive style, which paid off in the form of the ultimate prize in February. Luckily, those picks are all in the first five rounds. With no sixth or seventh-round picks, the draft room will have to hit on every selection beforehand.
This will be the first time the Chiefs have a first-round pick to work with since they took Mahomes back in 2017. The 2018 pick was packages for Mahomes, while last year’s selection was sent to the Seattle Seahawks in the Frank Clark trade.
At pick No. 32, who makes a ton of sense to don the red and gold?
First Round
32
Patrick Queen
LB LSU
Steve Spagnuolo vastly improved the Chiefs on the defensive side of the football in 2019. With a solid pass rush led by Clark and Jones and the duo of Mathieu and Juan Thornhill locking things down over the top, the linebacker position could use some attention. That’s where LSU’s Patrick Queen comes in.
Queen had an excellent 2019, building a reputation as a sideline-to-sideline linebacker with good speed and instincts in his first year as a full-time starter. He’s able to cover both tight ends and running backs, something the Chiefs are all too familiar with as their kryptonite. Queen could step in from day one and help fix that problem.
With Reggie Ragland departing via free agency and Anthony Hitchens failing to live up to the hefty contract he signed a few offseasons ago, Queen could be the linebacker of the present and future in Kansas City. That’d give the defense at least one playmaker at every level and would improve the front seven in the process.
Queen is just getting started. If last year was the teaser, then the real thing is going to be pretty darn good over the next 10-plus years. If he is available at 32, the Chiefs should think long and hard about picking him.