Quote:
Originally Posted by htismaqe
Taking an OT that is already on their board and is slotted at 32 is not a reach.
Taking an OT that wasn't on their board and/or is slotted way later than 32 is.
That's the point - not that taking an OT is an automatic reach but that they shouldn't let the Fisher injury change their draft strategy.
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I think the Eric Fisher almost has to change their draft strategy. Not only that, it changes the entire offseason strategy IMO.
First, you have a guy that you're looking at probably giving a 4 or 5 year extension and potentially reducing that cap hit this coming offseason. Now, you don't know if the guy will ever play another meaningful down of football.
Sure, Achilles aren't what they "used to be" but the percentage of players that never return still hovers around 25% and of the remainder, there is generally at least the same percentage decrease (25%) in playing time and production in 3 years post-injury.
Point being, this is probably the single most significant injury the Chiefs could have suffered sans Mahomes.
We can say with confidence, Eric Fisher isn't playing effective snaps in 2021 and is scheduled to be a FA in 2022. That's a problem for the front office. We can all hope that he is Jason Peters 2.0 and he returns to the same form and plays to 38 years old at a consistently dominant level, but the chances of that are extremely slim.
Veach's MO to this point has largely been to draft to replace FA departures in the next offseason. The important FAs in 2022 are Fisher, Schwartz, Mathieu, Nnadi, Duvernay-Tardif, and Damien Williams. If we operate under the assumption that Niang develops into the RT replacement for Schwartz and that Veach extends Mathieu (he's so critical to what they do on defense), then you still have LT, DT, RG, and RB2 as keys. That's to go along with other needs like DE, WR, and OC that weren't addressed well enough in 2020.
If we're looking at positional to round value, LT and DE are going to need to be high picks if we expect reasonable performance.
I don't think Veach is going to play a guessing game at LT with a generational QB to protect.
It's a bit of a weird year at LT but I think your top 5 are a Sewell, Darrisaw, Vera Tucker, Leatherwood, and Mayfield as prospects. Where they go though, is hard to pinpoint. I've seen Mayfield late in 1 or early 2 alot in draft mocks. We'll have to see how it shakes out, but I have to think if one of those guys is there at 32, then Veach is pulling the trigger.