NFL teams have been particularly slow in signing their draft picks this season and the Kansas City Chiefs have yet to sign a single draft pick. The coronavirus pandemic has obviously had an impact here, but even more for the Chiefs.
If you look at the past tradition when it comes to Kansas City signing their draft picks, they’re nearly always in the team facility when it happens. Last season, they signed four draft picks just ahead of the start of their rookie minicamp. They take the ceremonial picture in Brett Veach’s office signing their contract and it’s posted to social media. They might have to change their tradition slightly because of the virus, but I’d expect that players won’t officially sign contracts with the team until they’re finally allowed into the facility. Many of them are still in their hometowns waiting to get the call that they can report to Kansas City.
This isn’t a matter of finding the cap space to sign draft picks either. The Chiefs are well-removed from the cap-crunch that had them with $122 dollars in cap space earlier this offseason. They currently have over $6.2 million in cap space per the NFLPA’s public salary cap report. That should be more than enough to sign their rookie class and have some leftover cash for emergency signings and roll over for the 2021 season.
How much will signing the rookies cost? Below you can find salary projections for the Chiefs’ rookie class from Spotrac. These projections include total contract value, signing bonus money, and cap hit in 2020.
| Player | Total Value | Signing Bonus | Cap Hit |
| Clyde Edwards-Helaire | $10,821,572 | $5,430,234 | $1,967,559 |
| Willie Gay Jr. | $5,271,046 | $1,393,488 | $958,372 |
| Lucas Niang | $4,519,722 | $847,072 | $821,768 |
| L’Jarius Sneed | $3,929,320 | $634,320 | $768,580 |
| Mike Danna | $3,558,661 | $263,661 | $675,915 |
| BoPete Keyes | $3,377,819 | $82,919 | $630,715 |
At the end of the day, there’s no reason to worry that these players remain unsigned. We’re just waiting for them to get in front of the pen and paper to sign on the dotted line.
