The Chiefs entered last season riding streaks of nine consecutive AFC West titles and three straight trips to the Super Bowl. There was no reason to expect the long-dominant franchise to fall off a cliff in 2025, but that’s exactly what happened during a 6-11 campaign. It was the first time Kansas City finished below .500 in head coach Andy Reid‘s brilliant 13-year tenure. It was also the first time the team won fewer than 10 games in a season since 2014, quarterback Patrick Mahomes‘ freshman year at Texas Tech.
The Chiefs dropped to 6-8 and officially fell out of playoff contention in a Week 15 loss to the division-rival Chargers. Adding injury to insult, Mahomes tore the ACL and LCL in his left knee late in the game. It ended the all-time great’s season early, but the bigger concern was whether it would sideline Mahomes for any portion of 2026. Fortunately for the Chiefs, it appears they dodged that bullet. There is optimism the durable 10th-year signal-caller will be ready to participate in team drills when training camp starts later this month.
Assuming Mahomes – not new backup Justin Fields – is at the helm when the Chiefs’ season opens against the reigning division champion Broncos on Sept. 14, he will lead a similar cast of offensive characters. Longtime wingman Travis Kelce is back for a 13th year. Nearing his 37th birthday in October, Kelce is no longer at the height of his powers on the field. But the future Hall of Fame tight end remained among the game’s most productive players at his position last year. Kelce placed fourth among TEs in yards (851), sixth in catches (76) and 13th in touchdowns (five).
Age isn’t on his side, yet Kelce may still be the most reliable pass catcher on a team that didn’t make any obvious upgrades at receiver in the offseason. Complementary wideouts Marquise Brown and JuJu Smith-Schuster signed elsewhere, though the Chiefs did retain Tyquan Thornton on a two-year, $11MM accord. Thornton, rookie fifth-rounder Cyrus Allen and second-year man Jalen Royals will work behind Rashee Rice and Xavier Worthy, who will aim for healthier seasons. That assumes Rice will avoid a suspension for violating his probation, an offense that forced him to spend 30 days in jail late in the spring.
After missing three games with a concussion in 2025, Rice underwent cleanup surgery on his right knee in May. Owing to multiple injuries and a suspension, Rice missed 22 of the Chiefs’ 34 games from 2024-25. Meanwhile, Worthy never really got on track last season after tearing the labrum in his right shoulder in a Week 1 loss to the Chargers. The 5-foot-11, 165-pounder finished his second year with a disappointing 42 catches, 532 yards and a touchdown in 14 games.
Two years after the Chiefs traded up to snag him in the first round of the 2024 draft, Worthy is going into a pivotal season. Without a noticeable hike in production, the Chiefs may have a hard time exercising his fifth-year option next spring. The financial stakes are also enormous for Rice, who will play out the final year of his rookie deal. Should he avoid further off-field incidents and put up starting-caliber numbers, which he has done when healthy, Rice will be a candidate for a sizable raise in 2027.
While the Chiefs did little to address their receiving corps in the offseason, they made a seismic change in the backfield. A few weeks after he earned Super Bowl LX MVP honors, running back Kenneth Walker left the Seahawks to join the Chiefs on a three-year, $43.05MM deal. The four-year veteran and two-time 1,000-yard rusher should boost a ground game that ranked a lackluster 25th in yards last season.
The Chiefs did not re-sign Kareem Hunt or Isiah Pacheco after both players averaged fewer than 4.0 yards per carry on a combined 281 attempts in 2025. Walker notched an effective 4.6 per try on 221 carries. He owns a career mark of 4.3 on 821 carries.
Walker will run behind an offensive line that Pro Football Focus ranked as the 10th-best in the league last year. Starters Josh Simmons (left tackle), Kingsley Suamataia (left guard), Creed Humphrey (center) and Trey Smith (right guard) are all back. The main question is at right tackle. Having released their previous starter, the penalty-prone Jawaan Taylor, the Chiefs will stage a three-way battle amongJaylon Moore, Esa Pole and undrafted rookie Kahlil Benson this summer.
We would be remiss not to mention the return of offensive coordinator Eric Bieniemy, who replaced the departed Matt Nagy. While Reid will continue to call the offensive plays, he and Bieniemy worked great together during the latter’s first non-playcalling OC stint in Kansas City from 2018-22. The Chiefs boasted an elite attack each year and led the league in scoring twice during that span. They were nowhere close to that level in 2025, a year in which they checked at No. 21 in points (21.3 per game) and a similarly underwhelming 20th in yards.
On the other side of the ball, venerable defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo remains at the controls. He will head into his eighth year on the job having lost some important cogs in the offseason. The Chiefs traded No. 1 cornerback Trent McDuffie to the Rams in a blockbuster and then saw fellow starting corner Jaylen Watson follow him to Los Angeles in free agency. Safety Bryan Cook, linebacker Leo Chenal, and defensive linemen Charles Omenihu and Mike Danna also exited.
The Chiefs responded by spending the sixth overall pick on top-rated corner prospect Mansoor Delane, reuniting with fellow CB L’Jarius Sneed in free agency, signing safety Alohi Gilman, and drafting edge defender R Mason Thomas in the second round. They also used the 29th pick (acquired in the McDuffie package) on defensive tackle Peter Woods, who will work behind future Hall of Famer Chris Jones as a rookie.
Jones and free agent pickup Khyiris Tonga will start next to each other in the middle of the Chiefs’ line, which should get 2025 second-rounder Omarr Norman-Lott back from the torn ACL he suffered last October. Defensive end George Karlaftis, linebackers Nick Bolton and Drue Tranquill, CB Nohl Williams and DB Chamarri Conner join Jones and Karlaftis as other notable holdovers from last year’s solid defense. The Chiefs tied for 26th in sacks (35) and 29th in turnovers (14), but they overcame those issues to yield the sixth-fewest points in the league and rank 10th in yards allowed.
Even though their defense limited scoring and they registered an above-average plus-34 point differential last season, the Chiefs stumbled to an abysmal 1-8 record in one-score games. It was a crippling 180 for a team that went a jaw-dropping 11-0 in games decided by eight or fewer points during a 15-win showing in 2024. Just as there was negative regression in one-score games last year, it would be reasonable to expect positive regression in those situations this season. However, that doesn’t mean it will be enough for the Chiefs to return to the top of a daunting division that features two other contenders in the Broncos and Chargers.
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