Best of luck to Mike DeVito, the former Kansas City Chiefs’ defensive end who announced his retirement on Monday. But his departure from the game doesn’t alter their depth chart or their need to add another player at his position.
DeVito was a free agent, and it certainly appears the Chiefs were planning for life without him. They re-signed another defensive lineman, Jaye Howard, early in free agency. That was a sign DeVito was probably going to need to sign with another team if he was going to continue his career.
The Chiefs have Howard, Dontari Poe and Allen Bailey as their three regulars. Among their other defensive linemen is Nick Williams, a young and still developing player the Chiefs have some high hopes for.
The six Chiefs defensive linemen played a total of 2,412 snaps last season, according to ESPN Stats and Info. Poe was in the lineup for 721 defensive plays, or about 70 percent of them, despite having offseason back surgery. Howard was close behind with 710. Bailey played 556 snaps despite missing four games with injuries.
The Chiefs count on them for heavy use, which isn’t a bad strategy given the high-quality of their play. Howard (5.5 sacks) and Bailey (4.5) were among their leaders last season despite rarely being featured as pass rushers.
So the Chiefs don’t need another lineman to handle a ton of snaps. Williams could handle many of the 271 snaps DeVito took last season. The Chiefs could also give more work to Rakeem Nunez-Roches, last year’s sixth-round draft pick.
Bailey is signed to the Chiefs through the 2018 season, Howard through 2017. Poe’s contract has one more season. So the Chiefs look set with their starters for one more season and longer than that if they re-sign Poe before his contract expires. The only way the drafting of a lineman makes a lot of sense for the Chiefs is if they plan to let Poe walk when his deal is up, and that certainly doesn’t seem to be in their plan at this point.
This year’s draft is deep in defensive lineman, and the Chiefs will always find way to utilize a good player. But they don’t have to draft one this year.
