What the Kansas City Chiefs need to figure out this offseason – NFL Nation

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — The Kansas City Chiefs do not plan to let Sunday’s loss in Super Bowl LV outline them.

While the earlier two groups to lose the Super Bowl did not attain the playoffs the following season, the Chiefs appear poised to break that streak in 2021, even after their beautiful 31-9 loss to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

The Chiefs are the early betting favorites to win Super Bowl LVI in Los Angeles at 11-2, in accordance to Caesars Sportsbook, and so they had gained 25 of 27 video games coming into Super Bowl LV, with a Lombardi Trophy final season.

But that does not imply they do not have work to do this offseason, and avoiding the hangover skilled by some current Super Bowl-losing groups might rely upon what strikes they make and the way they reply to lacking out on back-to-back rings.

“Obviously, it hurts right now,” quarterback Patrick Mahomes mentioned. “It hurts a lot. But we’re going to continue to get better. We have a young group of guys that had a lot of success and we learned from that, but we’ve had a few failures and we have to learn from that.

“We cannot let this outline us. We have to proceed to get higher going into subsequent yr and put together ourselves to hopefully be in this recreation once more. We knew it wasn’t all the time going to achieve success and we weren’t going to give you the option to win 1,000 championships in a row. We knew we had been going to undergo occasions like this and adversity. I believe the neatest thing about it’s the guys now we have have the management skill to be even higher subsequent yr.”

The Chiefs have a collection of good, young players, with many signed for the long term. Mahomes won’t turn 26 until September. Tyreek Hill is 26, Chris Jones 26, Tyrann Mathieu 28, L’Jarius Sneed 24, Clyde Edwards-Helaire 21. All except Mathieu are under contract at least through 2022. Mathieu has one more season remaining on his contract.

But that guarantees the Chiefs nothing. The loss to the Bucs is evidence of that.

“It’s a troublesome factor even to get again to this recreation,” coach Andy Reid said. “But that is what this is all about, and it simply exhibits you the coronary heart of those guys and what they’ve accomplished to put ourselves able to a minimum of have a possibility to do this. We’ve acquired to play higher. We’ve acquired to use it as motivation to assist get ourselves again once more.”

The Chiefs have a long list of potential unrestricted free agents. The group is headed by wide receivers Sammy Watkins and Demarcus Robinson, middle Austin Reiter, defensive ends Tanoh Kpassagnon and Alex Okafor, cornerback Bashaud Breeland and security Daniel Sorensen.

All have been productive for the Chiefs, at least at times. But they may have to live without any of them because of a tight salary-cap situation.

The Chiefs have greater than $200 million in wage-cap commitments for 2021. The league restrict has not been set, however the Chiefs will nearly definitely have to trim to get under that quantity. General supervisor Brett Veach lately mentioned the Chiefs could be in good condition if the wage cap is about at $185 million, but it surely might are available under that quantity.

“We always have a couple of different road maps to get us where we want to be, and we’ll certainly have some tough decisions to make in regards to trying to keep as many players on this team intact,” Veach mentioned.

The Chiefs have not invested a lot by way of cash or excessive draft picks of their offensive line since Veach grew to become basic supervisor in 2017. They have drafted simply three offensive linemen in that point however just one above the sixth spherical.

Veach could have to change his philosophy. Starting tackles Mitchell Schwartz and Eric Fisher missed the Super Bowl due to accidents, and their returns for subsequent season are unsure.

In their absence, the Chiefs’ offensive line was overwhelmed by the Bucs. Mahomes was pressured on 52% of his dropbacks Sunday.

The Bucs blitzed solely six occasions. They as an alternative inflicted most of their harm with simply 4 gamers.

Mahomes was 8-of-24 for 95 yards and an interception when below strain. He was 1-of-12 for 4 yards and an interception when flushed from the pocket.