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New offseason exercise again shows Patrick Mahomes’ importance

On Monday, NFL.com writer Tom Blair went through an interesting exercise: building the best full 53-man NFL roster that would fit under the league’s 2025 salary cap, based on this season’s cap figure for each player.

He limited himself to 24 players on their rookie contracts: no more than four first-round picks, four second-round selections, four third-round picks and up to a dozen players taken in Rounds 4 through 7. Players set to play on fifth-year rookie options this season (and undrafted players) were not counted in this group.

Only two Kansas City Chiefs — including running back Isiah Pacheco, chosen as RB3 behind Saquon Barkley and Bucky Irving — made Blair’s All-Cap Team. The other one topped the list.

Quarterbacks: $32.2 million total (11.6% of cap)

Patrick Mahomes · Kansas City Chiefs · $28.1 million

Bo Nix ·Denver Broncos · $4.2 million

I could load up on all the star power I wanted elsewhere on the field, but this is the position that will determine the success of my roster. And while I admire the real-world savvy of teams that can calibrate the right supporting cast around a sensibly priced rookie or capable veteran, I didn’t have to play those games in the realm of make-believe.

With all $279.2 million of the cap at my disposal at this point, I could take anyone. In fact, I was tempted to build around Lamar Jackson ’s $43.5 million cap hit, just to play out my theory that it is possible to devote massive resources to a generational talent and still field a winning team.

I just couldn’t justify passing on one of the only QBs I’d take over Jackson in a start-from-scratch situation, especially when Patrick Mahomes is also a generational talent with a cap hit — ranked 14th at the position — that makes him, absurdly, a value choice. As for the backup spot, I didn’t want to settle for the kind of safe, replacement-level vet so many teams default to when I could earmark a measly $4.2 million for someone who could actually win games if needed. To me, using one of my four first-round slots on Bo Nix is eminently worthwhile if it means safeguarding this super-team against any bad luck with Mahomes.

Here are the other starters from Blair’s 53-man roster:

Offense

WR Justin Jefferson

WR Puka Nacua

WR Ladd McConkey

TE Brock Bowers

LT Jordan Mailata

LG Landon Dickerson

C Zach Frazier

RG Dominick Puni

RT Penei Sewell

Defense

EDGE Myles Garrett

EDGE Micah Parsons

IDL Jalen Carter

IDL Kobie Turner

LB Fred Warner

LB Zack Baun

CB Patrick Surtain II

CB Christian Benford

S Kyle Hamilton

S Kerby Joseph

NB Cooper DeJean

Specialists

K Brandon Aubrey

P Corey Bojorquez

LS Ross Matiscik

My take

In an offseason where one national writer after another has argued that Kansas City’s quarterback is a shell of his former self — or that Team X, Y or Z is prepared to push the Chiefs off the league’s summit — Blair comes back to Planet Earth, arguing that even at a 2025 cap hit of $28.1 million, Mahomes is the quarterback to build a team around.

Without saying so directly, Blair also credits general manager Brett Veach with designing Mahomes’ contract so that even in the ninth year of his career (and the sixth under 2020’s 10-year, $500 million contract extension), Mahomes can still be considered a value in this exercise. That’s a remarkable achievement.

Meanwhile, he continues to show that in almost any game — and with virtually any group of players around him — no other player can give his team a better chance to win. As long as he remains on the team, Kansas City’s Super Bowl window will remain open.

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