‘OEI: Orientation, Evaluation, Installation’ – Chiefs Rookie Minicamp Recap | Defending The Kingdom

‘OEI: Orientation, Evaluation, Installation’ – Chiefs Rookie Minicamp Recap | Defending The Kingdom

Well, I think the NFL season is officially underway because there have been guys on the field. Yes, the Chiefs just completed their rookie mini camp and actually start an onfield instruction of OTAAS. But it was a very eventful weekend and we’re going to jump in with the OEI on this edition of Defending the Kingdom. Of course, it’s always brought to you by Ticketmaster, your best friend, even throughout the non-playing season for concerts and other events. And oh, I don’t know. The World Cup’s coming up really soon. Mahomes keeps it on an RPO at the five. Gets a lead block. He goes into the end zone near side. Touchdown, Kansas City. Hi everyone, I’m Mitch Holtis, voice of the Kansas City Chiefs along with senior team reporter Matt McMullen. And let’s just do a kind of a game here. What do you think? We’re going to talk about an OEI in this episode. Could it be the Office of Evaluation and Inspection in the Health and Yes, that’s it. in the in the depart in the department of health in the part of health and human services they really look at Medicaid fraud right so we could do 50 minutes on that or or we do the slang term I’ve got to be really careful with these acronyms uh dictionary oh yeah but it’s that’s not bad or nasty or get me going to HR it’s just for mild shock Oi like oh okay okay could be that that we’re going to discuss or it could be of course the international agency started in 1948 that represents 23 sovereign states Spanish-sp speakaking countries Portuguese speaking uh speaking countries or uh Catal Catal is it Catalani Catalani Catalan yeah Catalan Catalan which they speak like in Barcelona yeah it’s eastern it’s eastern Spain primarily but the rest of these other sovereign states are either Spanish or Portuguese speakaking countries That also is the OEI that we might be discussing or we may not talk about any of that. I mean I I think everyone’s hoping we don’t. I think everyone’s like what are we listening to lost it me he didn’t you clowns you clown had Philippines in the wrong hemisphere. We will not get into OEI like maybe most of the world looks at it, but we’re going to get into rookie mini camp and what happened recently in OEI meaning orientation, evaluation, and installation. And so all three of those things vital uh on what was just completed with rookie mini camp. But before we do any of that in that version of OEI, what do we have around the world? Yeah, I’ve got four today for Rashi Rice who were once again I feel like I say it every single week. We’re very excited to see what Rashi can do. Hey, can I say this? I don’t I’m interrupting you, but the guys were here today. Yeah. I got to see a lot of the guys fist pumping, hugging. And when you said Rashi Rice, it’s like, you know, to see those wide receivers walk down the hallway and just fist pumping and hugging. I’m like, okay. Yeah, it’s about that time. It’s getting there. It’s funny because what Mitch is describing is today, today is May 6th. Uh it’s the beginning of phase two of the offseason training program and what that means is they can finally go on the field and do some stuff like you alluded to earlier. Now there’s no like actual team drills going on. They’re not wearing pads. You can’t even do offense versus defense right now. But for the first time all off season they can come in here. They can go out on the field with the coaches and do like individual work and uh position drills like in shorts. So it’s not quite football but it’s one step closer to football. And I’m with you. Seeing the parking lot full today and just thinking about how like the journey really begins right now is a lot of fun. Now, anyway, around the world, should I jump into it? Let’s go. Okay. So, we got a a listener let us know where are any of them from the 23 sovereign states of the OEI? Uh, let’s see. No, unfortunately not. Yeah. Let us know if you’re in the OEI. It have been a mere coincidence. But, uh, remember last week we were trying to figure out where Junction City, Oregon was? Yeah. So, someone helped us out. It is uh 10 miles north of Eugene. Go Ducks. Go Ducks. So, now we know. You know, I spent some time in Eugene when I lived in Oregon because I worked for the Salem Kaiser Volcanoes and we go around the the Northwest League and there was a team in Eugene. It was the Cubs affiliate at the time. It was the Eugene Emeralds and they played at the Oregon Ducks baseball stadium. Nice. It was pretty cool. So, I went down to Eugene a few times. Right now, if you say Oregon Ducks, I’m mesmerized by Jeffrey Bassa, but that’s okay. And maybe we can talk about Jeffrey a little bit later because Jeffrey looked pretty good this weekend. Um, Bill was from McFersonson, Kansas. McFerson. I messed this up every time. It’s okay. Cuz the kicker from the Bengals is McFersonson. Yeah, that must be what it is. But they have shirts. My wife’s from McFersonen. I knew that. Yeah, she’s in the Ring of Honor there. She was an awesome athlete, by the way. Still is. But they have shirts that saying there’s no fear in McFersonen. Okay. So, but but the kicker, it’s an honest mistake and it’s made all the time. It’s all Scottish, right? But McFersonen. Okay. McFersonen because I’ve gotten like Nevada, Missouri down. Yep. Um and there’s a few others, but McFersonen. McFersonen. McFersonen. I will not screw that up again. Home of the Bull Pups. The Bull Pups. 14 state basketball titles. So, this is a good one. Nikki wants to know if you’re familiar with Hayawa, Kansas. Yes. Right at Highway 36. Uh not far from the Nebraska border, just south of Fall City, Nebraska. Home of the Red Hawks. Red Hawks. Okay. Yeah, that’s a good one. And then lastly, uh this is more of just a general question. Uh Dolly wants to know if you poured water on your head when we drafted Josh Simmons. Full disclosure, no. But that doesn’t mean you can’t pour water on your head every time. We were live on a a live stream. Would have been difficult. Yeah. So there you go. I was We were live on a live stream. I’m not going to do it live on a live stream. Yeah. But Jaylen Royals I did go skipping down the hallway. Day three is a little bit more like unhinged. Like we were being very professional on uh Thursday night and we were talking about Josh Simmons and getting into it on the live stream. Like I talked about last week, Saturday is kind of a free-for-all. Like we we our hair is all messed up. Like we haven’t eaten. Death warmed over. Yeah, exactly. Like I was watching some of my videos that I did and I look so like full of life and energy on Thursday and I look like a corpse on Saturday. But hey, we were still excited. Anyway, that’s all I got for you today. Yeah, we were the I know everything goes back to Shaw Shank, which I know is a 90s movie, right? But we look like Tim Robbins after like 50 days in downstairs. We’re like in the corner. It’s like the shoving us dog food under the Well, and it’s a juxosition because like we’re having fun like we’re enjoying it, but our our bodies are deteriorating. It’s not good. And well, and you had a wonderful night out by your wife taking you in a mariachi band and the whole bit. You were just worn out and get you were recharged by your beautiful wonderful wife. I was. Yeah. Yeah. But it is a uh man, it’s a long weekend. It is. So is kind of so is rookie mini camp. And I heard you did a fabulous job with the rookie dinner on Friday night, which is the first part of the OEI here because the weekend is really an orientation. And we have all these groups of people we’re going to talk about, but generally there are the drafties. We’ll get into those guys. There’s the 16 undrafted free agents. They’re here. Couple of current guys on the roster. They are uh can do it based on the rules and based on their playing time or lack thereof or uh and those guys are interesting. You forget about those guys. Yeah. And then there’s the try out guys. Was there like 67 of them or something? Well, so I wrote it all down. There were 87 total players at the camp, right? So 16 try out players. Wow. Exactly 60. So, also two veteran tryyout guys. Yeah. Um Geron Hayek was back. Remember him from last year? Oh, yeah. Um but yeah, seven draft picks, 16 undrafted free agents who were already under contract, 60 try out players, then two current players. Can you guess who they were? Do you know who they were? The two the two current players that were here. Yeah. Chris Odoken and Chewy Godric. Yeah. Chris Hodoken and Chewy Godric. And you know, with Chris Adoken, him being at this camp is so helpful for the coaches because he’s been here for so long and can actually execute the offense. And it really does help the players that are trying to show what they can do, especially the try out guys, like for them to actually put their best foot forward. It’s difficult when the quarterbacks are also trying to figure out what’s happening. And I think it helped these guys because as of now, as of this recording, this could all change. But we signed two of the try out guys. We signed Major Williams, a safety from Carson Newman University, D2. Pretty cool. Carson Newman, Tennessee, baby. That’s a Yeah, they’re a D2 power. And then, uh, Jimmy Holiday, uh, from Louisiana Tech. Um, 658 allpurpose yards last year. Uh, he’s a receiver. Um, kind of a multiaceted player who can do a little bit of everything. And both those guys looked good during rookie mini camp. But I’m getting ahead of myself. You were talking about the rookie dinner. The rookie dinner is cool because basically it’s over at the stadium. In the last two years, Mitch has been out of town and I’ve had a chance to host it and it’s an awesome opportunity because yeah, the draft picks are there. Yeah, the UDFAs that are under contract are there, but for me more than anything, it’s for the try out players because the reality is the vast majority of them, this is their only shot ever at the NFL. and they probably might know that that this is their one weekend where they can be an NFL player, but there’s no uh demarcation line that weekend between a first round pick and a try out player. You’re all rookies. You’re all part of the Chiefs for that weekend. And it’s cool because Clark Hunt’s there, Coach Reed is there, um Brett V is there, everyone is there and you’re celebrating making it to the NFL, whether it be for a 10-year career or three days. And it’s pretty cool to be a part of that. Um, all the former Chiefs legends are there like Bobby Bell was there and Willie Laneir was there. Uh, Bill Moss was there. Uh, even more current players were there talking about what it means to be a Chief. Just stuff like that. I get wrapped up in that kind of thing. And for the try out players, you can tell it really meant a lot. Yeah. And it’s always key for those guys to make sure there’s a photographer. Steve Sanders was on his game. Get me out on a drill so I can prove it to my grandkids. I was in a Chief’s uniform for a try out. That’s one. And I loved it. There were 17 ambassadors here or 17 former players. Yeah. Which I think that’s a great representation. Um, and the fact that when you’re sitting in the chair, whether you’re a try out guy or you’re a drafted player, you get a sense of the where you’re at and I always call it a conduit, you’re running a relay race, there was someone in that chair before you. There’ll be someone there after you. But whatever category you’re in, you’re there on that night. And so again, to give you kudos, I just heard you did a phenomenal job. Well, thank you. And there’s such and you’re so great to represent this franchise to those guys. And then you get like the local guys, right? Um the more kid, the linebacker from Lewisburg, uh who’s played at K State or Jared Casey from Planeville. Yeah. Planeville Cardinals, right? And uh had such a great career at KU. And you never know, these two guys were signed, which we call kind of the Echo Boydo guys because this is Echo Boydo just showed up with Cleat one day, a immigrant from Ghana, uh, who played at K State and Lawrence High for the Chastity Lions, but made the team and got a Super Bowl ring. And you never know from that pool of guys where you’re supplementing practice squad. And so that’s doesn’t necessarily mean end all beall for those guys. And the fact you’re in the building wearing that uniform doing drills somehow could mean to something later. That’s part of what I spoke about at the rookie dinner is I try to do a little mix of, you know, hey, welcome to Chief’s Kingdom. This is what we’re all about. Talk about the history a little bit, but also our recent history, all the success, and it’s not just Patrick Mahomes and Travis Kelce and Chris Jones. It’s guys like Carson Steel, Nico Rami, Mike Caliendo, Malik Herring, Jack Cochran, Cam Jones, Chris Roland Wallace. Those were all players that went undrafted and earned their spot over the course of the summer. And it began with the Chiefs rookie mini camp. And to a further extent, you’re right, Echo Boydo wasn’t even signed after the draft. Had to come here on a tryyout basis like u Major Williams and Jimmy Holiday did this past weekend. Uh surrounded by 50 60 other players and somehow stand out over the course of three days where you can’t even hit each other. And it’s such a testament to these players. they put so much work in and it’s so difficult and to have that payoff of either being able to stick around for at least a little bit longer making it to training camp like remember Vatitali German the offensive lineman um was a try out player uh earned a contract made it to training camp didn’t make it into the season but still you made it to a full training camp with the Kansas City Chiefs. I mean that says a lot. That’s really hard. So I just have so much respect for these guys and it really adds to the journey I think when you see all they go through this time of year. No question. So, if you came to uh talk about the um office of uh let’s see, evaluation and inspection to look into Medicaid fraud, you came to the wrong place. Although it’d be a fascinating topic. Uh we’re going to talk though about orientation and also evaluation installation. But I want to jump into the draft picks. The the weekend to me did nothing to deter my excitement about the 2025 class. Yeah. And I want to start with the defensive guys because I think this defensive group has a real chance to make more of an immediate impact than maybe we think or or when we you know when I look at them and what they did you see where Omar Norman lot his first step quickness is can be so impactful and you saw why those 20% of the snaps he had and you alluded to with the snap with the best win rate ratio because that dude dude looks like he can really help and maybe help from day one. And we have to preface this by it’s really hard for those guys to stand out this time of year because until training camp, they can’t put pads on and they can’t hit each other. Even when phase three starts in a couple weeks and all the veterans are here for what we kind of recognize as OTAAS and the rookies and the veterans are on the field together, offense versus defense, you get seven on seven, even 11 on 11, they’re still in shorts. They’re not wearing pads. It’s just about impossible to evaluate the defensive and offensive lines when they can’t actually hit each other. But you can see the first step quickness. You can see their explosion off the line. And both Omar Norman Lot and Ashton Gelotti like were flashing throughout practice. Like Gelotti was at the quarterback immediately on a handful of snaps and like messing with the aerodynamics of the throw. That stood out to me. and Norman Lot, I think it’s even harder to stand out as an interior rusher because you have nowhere to get around and you can’t you can’t go through the guy. But yeah, the first step quickness really stood out. So, I’m with you that we keep talking about how this draft class has the potential to be like a 2022 kind of draft class. They got to go out there and earn it, but this was the first step. And you always say this, you can’t like win the Super Bowl this weekend, but you can lose it. Well, draft class can’t necessarily earn that reputation this weekend, but they could maybe lose it. Like if we were watching them and saying like, “Oh, that was kind of disappointing. I didn’t get that at all with really any of these players, but the defenders are a great way to start.” Yeah. What’s apparent with Gelotti and and sometimes with a college pass rusher, this is where I think Felix now going into his third year, Felix Inudiku Zama is learning, but Gelotti you can see already has uh a pass rush strategy because many college players can get by just on quickness or speed or maybe one move. But we talked about because you’re right, the one thing you can’t see in a mini camp setting even without pads is the footwork and hand placement. Yeah. and how quick that is or how quick the counter measures are. You can you can tell Gelotti’s work with George Carlus. They look the same. Oh my gosh, they look like the same player. Is he Greek? I don’t Does he have Greek heritage? Did he play water polo? But but you could see it like he’s got a pass rush plan and that plan includes countermeasures. And so if a lineman shows him a certain uh move, then he’s got now not saying he’s there yet, but he just made the point very well. It’s an alpha point. This is just a start. But I like where Gelott is starting. I do too. I’m really excited about it. And it reminds me of watching rookie mini camp back in 2022 when George looked like Derek Thomas, you know, going against a lot of players who were try out guys, right? And you hope that your draft picks elevate and look the part against players that frankly at times might be a lesser competition. They you want them to look and stand out. Well, I think Gelotti did. Gelotti just throughout the practice reminded me a lot of what George looked like several years ago. and it’s the speed around the edge. You can tell he has power that he can’t quite show off yet, but I’m just really fired up for the pads to come on in training camp because we’ll learn even more about these players. But for Gelotti to come in here as a rookie over the course of rookie mini camp and to have a plan already is impressive to me because a lot of times in college, particularly for players that are being drafted on day one or day two, you can get away with being just a better athlete or being stronger or bigger than the competition in college. We see that all the time where players are really good in college and they have all the measurables but they don’t work out in the NFL because they never had to deal with everyone being as good as they are. Well, Gelotti to me to have a plan like he did throughout rookie mini camp. That just bodess well I think for his future when he’s facing top tier competition in the NFL because already he’s thinking about how do I outsmart the guy across from me, not just using his talent to beat him like he could have at Louisville. As Matt told you, we’re recording this on May the 6th. Earlier today, I spoke at a damn conference. Now, I’m not cussing. It was the core of engineers and a bunch of civil engineers from all across the country. And what they do is make dams. Okay? So, it’s a damn conference. It’s a thankless job. People have to do that. No one thinks about who makes the dam, you know. They don’t until we have 1993 or 2011 or levies break or we have the worst disasters of our lives. Yeah. That’s what I told this crew today. like we we trust them with our lives and nobody thinks about it until they have to think about it. But the reason I brought that up was a guy came up who was educated at at Cal lives in California but he’s an engineer that was educated at Cal. He goes Tony Gonzalez and he wanted to talk about Tony Gonzalez not a Chiefs fan 49ers fan but he wanted to talk about Tony Gonzalez. I’m like, “Hey, Mitchell Schwarz, right tackle on the Super Bowl 54 team.” But I said, “We have a young man named Williams that I really, really like who ended his uh career at Cal.” And Nel Williams to me, if Spags went into Brett V and said, “Here’s what I want you to get in the 25 draft class,” I think on the screen it would pop up. No Williams. I It’s exciting to see what he can do. He looks like a guy that fits this scheme, wants to tackle, thick enough, can cover, but he was kind of everywhere. Yeah, he was. And like we talked about last week, a player like him, a lot of them weren’t available at the point that she were drafting. Like if we didn’t grab N Williams when we did, I don’t know if we were going to find a player who could do a little bit of everything. Maybe we could have found like a a Nickelback slot kind of guy, which is important. But I think Null has like the physical attributes and the skill set where you can play him in the slot if you want to, but you can also play him outside and he has like the safety versatility that we talked about previously. It’s hard to find a player like that and I think Nell has it and he looked the part this weekend too. I mean, just making plays on the ball. The nice thing about this, it’s kind of the inverse of the issue with the offensive and defensive lines and the running backs in the running game because you can’t really run the ball at all or or hit or have live contact, but it’s a passing camp. So, they’re throwing the ball every single snap. So, for a corner like null trying to get your feet wet a little bit, this was a great first opportunity because I mean, how many snaps do you think he got out there? Like a million. A gazillion. Over and over and over. The only one that probably got more was the guy we’re going to next, Bassa, because he might have, did he ever come off the field? I don’t think so. Um, but you can see where Noah Williams, and I’m like you, I just want to see more of him and more and more and more. But I get so excited. I see a lot of Chamari Connor in him. Uh, I think that’s a decent comp. We know about the crazy ball skills. We went over that on the last episode, but there is instinct and understanding with N Williams that really excites me. um particularly as complicated as this defensive scheme is where he can trick a quarterback into a play and with his ball skills you have uh the real uh opportunity to get explosive defensive plays. Well, he’s he’s impressive, right? Just a multitude of ways. And so is Jeffrey Bassa, who you just were speaking about. Like Vassa, go listen to his press conference. Like just that alone, it makes you think, I can tell why this guy was a green dot. I can tell why this guy was the quarterback of the defense and the leader at Oregon. And that’s no easy task to be the quarterback of a defense playing major college football on a program that has national championship expectations. I mean, think about the pressure there. And I think that actually helps him a lot coming here because you come to the Chiefs, there are expectations right away. Even for rookies, like you’re expected to come in here and if you can’t keep up, they’re going to find somebody else, right? And that’s the same kind of thing at Oregon and at these major college programs. And he dealt with that and was the green dot. He was the leader. He was the one the coaches trusted to execute the play calls defensively. And he explained that of course there’s a lot coming in. So he thought that day one was pretty good, but there were some areas he could get better. Day two was the same thing, like got better in some ways, but here’s how I can continue to improve. That’s like the perfect mindset to have. He didn’t look overwhelmed to me at all. Would you agree with that? Oh, no. In fact, he reminds me of the kid who’s taking college algebra in sixth grade and calc as a junior. Yeah, you’re taking calc as a junior. Yeah, I’ve got calc 2 next year. That’s what it looks like. And you can just see where he’s wicked smart and in control and understanding. Um, and so when you project it ahead, and again, it’s it’s rookie mini camp. I got it. We could we’ll just put a caveat on it. But there’s more there than meets the eye because when you go when you look at his video at Oregon, you’re seeing kind of stuff all over the place, especially as his uh career grew there. But in the rookie mini camp, Bassa, first of all, he looks more physical than he did at Oregon. Sure. Doesn’t he’s doing I’d agree with that. Yeah. And then he’s in control. It’s like he’s this is like a you know when you It’s like a baby bolt. He’s like a baby Nick Bolton. And I don’t mean that derogatory like he’s sitting there going I So what does that do? That that tells you that with Bass. Here’s where I get excited. Looks like he can play Sam, Will, or Mike. And he played Mike and he’s running the ran the defense in the senior bowl, but he also was like running the show here. And so all of a sudden now you’ve got insurance for every spot uh on the defense and a green dot who can play for a green dot if need be. because Ben Bolt’s gone down. Tranquil’s done it. He’s really good at it. Uh but now you’ve got a guy that can you don’t have to move Tranquil because Bolt’s down. You got Abasa and I think special teams wise, him Williams, we got I even Gelotti. Uh I’m seeing those guys. Those guys could all be special teams studs for sure. Uh again, there are so many reasons to be excited about this class. It’s the special teams value immediately. It’s the depth, but also I can just see these players growing into major contributors over time. And that’s why we were so excited about the 2022 class. Same kind of thing. Like we think they can help us out in these ways right away. But you can see there’s a clear room for growth where these guys could be like like major contributors. Maybe sooner than later, but for sure like down the road, these are building blocks for this team to keep this thing going for a long time if they can keep building on their success. And like you said, I mean it is rookie mini camp. I’m not trying to get too fired up about it. I understand this was not with the veterans. The pads weren’t on. We’ll find out in training camp how much they can really gel with everyone. But again, especially with a player like Bassa when he’s being asked to take in information, transmit information with players that he’s never met before, all the try out guys that are here and he did not look like he was overwhelmed. Like it would be very easy to look at him and be like, man, he his head’s spinning a million miles an hour. And there have been rookies in the past that I’m not going to talk about where you can tell it’s a lot. And that’s okay because it’d be a lot for anyone. But I just think coming away from it, uh, he really impressed me in particular as someone that was able to handle a very stressful situation uh, with great poise. So, yeah, fired up about him. All four of these defensive draftes look like Spags guys to me. Well, didn’t Spags like like run into the uh, the draft room and say like, “Hey, uh, Bass is still on the board.” And they traded up for him. I mean, they traded up for a lot of these guys. Traded up for Nell Williams, right? Yeah, I think so. Yeah, definitely traded up for basketball. And they knew they they knew he’d be gone. Yeah. Like you just made that point. They knew. In fact, that’s uh you know, Brad talked about it like they had to move to get him. You’re going to trade up for a player, it means that you really liked him. And sometimes you let the board fall to you. We talk all about that. And that’s a good thing to do sometimes because let the board fall to you. whatever player you have on top of your board or uh near the top of the board that makes sense, you go with that player. But sometimes if you see a player that you love and he’s not too far away and he’s not going to make it 10 15 more spots, you go get him. If he fits your scheme, if he fits your culture and what you’re trying to do and clearly we did it with these guys and it’s got to be exciting for them to actually get these players on the field and for them to find success early on. The next step for these guys is to transmit that now uh translate that now to OTAAS here in a couple weeks when the veterans are here. Again, we’re not talking about OEI, the international agency of 23 sovereign states. Uh just in case you’re waiting for that, just in case you we’re not gonna talk about it today, you know, further demand, but I will say Chris McGowan, right, the battalion commander of the Irish Brigade, who is a seasoned tickleher of defending the kingdom and uh defends the kingdom all across the globe. He’s been in the military around the military all of his life. And the military is nothing but acronyms. Yeah. Everything, you know, fistic we know. It feels like they go out of their way to create acronyms. Yeah, they do. Does it have to be an acronym? Like he could have just said it, but that’s all right. Like bold order. Can’t you just say bold order? No, it’s BO, man. It’s BO. Oh, that’s BO. I didn’t think it I thought BO was body order. No, no, it’s bold order. Um, but it’s acronym. So, this acronym for this episode is orientation, evaluation, and installation with rookie minan. Now, let’s jump into the offensive uh rookies. Josh Simmons, we know because of his injury, is going to be way limited. To me, this is where the installation part comes in for Josh because and and even evaluation because even though he’s not involved in the activities physically, almost all of them not being involved, how mentally is he involved? Is he mentally repping? If he’s with the O line, first of all, and it sounds subtle, but he’s hearing the way uh, you know, he’s hearing the way the offensive line coaches talk. he’s hearing the way Andy Hack teaches or what he says and is he paying attention and is he soaking in everything he possibly can because if you’re not physically repping it, it’s t hard to just do it mentally. And so to me, it was evaluation and installation for Josh to pour so much into there so it’s some point it doesn’t become where you’re going to have to think because it’s a it’s a total reaction uh position. But to me, I think that’s where Josh Simmons is at least to get started. Yeah. got to find ways to stay engaged. The good news is he wasn’t just standing on the sideline like all of rookie mini camp. He was doing individual stuff. He was in a jersey out there in shorts and he would do individual stuff. He would line up with the offensive line uh when they were doing just their their positional drills, right? So, uh, if you’ve never watched like a training camp at practice, it has lots of segments to it where you do individual work, you do position stuff, you’ll do in installs where you, uh, go over the plays basically, and then you’ll go into like a seven on seven or an 11 on 111 offensive versus defense. He wasn’t doing any offense versus defense. Wasn’t doing any stuff that required like contact, but he was doing a lot of the individual and positional stuff where uh you’re able to do those mental reps. And then when you watch it, when you’re watching your teammates do the actual offensive versus defensive stuff, at least you can be thinking about, okay, here’s what I worked on. Here’s how it looks in practice. And it’s up to him to fully appreciate that and to use that when he can actually go out there and do the full contact, right? So, I mean, so far so good. It’s going to be an incomplete grade for Josh Simmons for a while now until he can go out there and play. But at least he was doing some stuff and that’s progress. I think the grade we can’t see and we won’t see is the grade he gets and how much he’s absorbing and when he’s facing coach Reed or facing coach heck and getting the test, you know, are you passing that test and did you pay attention in class? That’s where he’s at right now. Jaylen Royals, you know, we’re excited about him. Um it looked like it was he was just showing us what was on his draft sheet in the fact that understanding coverages route running especially in a short area route running. Um and it’ll be it’ll be a learning and work in progress but there was enough to see where you could get excited how Jaylen Royals could help this team. Yeah, he stood out. Uh so I counted the number of catches he had on Sunday. He had 10 catches during seven on seven and 11 on 111 stuff. That’s a lot because they’re trying to spread the ball all over the place. And keep in mind, I mean, the team portion of practice is maybe like 40%, 30%. Like, it’s not a lot of the entire practice. So, he was getting a high percentage of targets thrown his way during those periods of practice and I felt like made the most of it for the most part. Um, you can see how he’s going to help this team immediately. I think it’s in a lot of ways how the Chiefs used Rashi in his rookie year where it’s a lot of behind the line of scrimmage stuff. It’s a lot of like tunnel screens and like wide receiver screens and stuff like that underneath throws because that’s where he makes his money. I mean, he has this like stocky build where he’s fast, but he’s not necessarily going to be like go route guy. I don’t think he’s like he’s going to outmaneuver a defender. He’s going to use his route running. He’s going to use uh his ability to get around the guy once he makes the catch, make a few guys miss. That’s kind of his strong suit and I think coach Reed’s going to put him in a position where he can kind of take advantage of what makes him such a great player and I think we saw it a little bit during rookie camp. Again, no like full contact here, but the flashes were there for sure and I’m glad he got a high volume and he was catching the football. That’s the most important thing. Uh he even talked about how that first day it’s pretty nerve-wracking. Like you’re out there as a professional, but then kind of the second and third day you kind of know the the whole routine. Just go out there and do what you’ve done your whole life, right? And I think he showed real improvement throughout the weekend. That and the fact that you could see conditioning wise, now it wasn’t St. Joseph hot, but the weather was gorgeous. It was amazing. And the fact though that he’s these wide receivers run they’re running 20 to 30 to 40 yards all the time in the drills and straight back and and go right back and do it again. And you’re thinking cuz didn’t Rushy like blow chunks? Yeah, he did. So I was thinking he was day one at rookie mini camp last year. It’s like hey man Rushy’s blowing chunks out there on the field. Well so hey he’s come a long way since hurling. But um you know why that’s important though? Because in so many ways, the way that Coach Reed uses rookie mini camp is it is essentially a trial run of OTAAS. Because if the rookies came in for OTAAS in three weeks without any of this or even if like rookie mini camp was kind of like a blowoff kind of thing, it would be overwhelming. It’d be way too much because you’re surrounded by like 10ear veterans, professionals that know exactly what they’re doing moving at the pace of practice. It would be too much. Rookie mini camp is great because it’s essentially the first couple days of OTAAS. You’re you’re like practicing before things get real. So I think Rashi would be the first one to say like he’d much rather be puking at rookie mini camp than like it be day one or day two of OTAAS, right? And we saw him make real strides between rookie mini camp and OTAAS back when he was a rookie. It was like night and day. So message delivered. Exactly. So, I think for these guys, it helps kind of shake off that anxiety, that nervousness of like I’m playing for the Kansas City Chiefs right now, and that’s Andy Reed over there. You know, uh, for them, they can get through that part, get through the jitters. And when they come back for OTAAS, it’s football. You’re good at this. You were brought here for a reason. And that’s why I think Coach Reed utilizes rookie mini camp in the perfect way. And when you came in and you parked that vehicle for OTAAS, now you know what to expect. Exactly. So, and I didn’t see Jaylen. He didn’t blow chunks, did he? No, he looked great. Yeah. So, he’s off to a great start. Better the last day than maybe was the first day. So, that’s that’s also a good sign. All right. Uh Brashard Smith, same thing. Look kind of like looking at his sheet. But the instinct that he has as a running back and his ability to be involved at a first level or second level area to catch the football, I think showed up. Um, now protections for any guy coming into the NFL at running back and particularly with Brashad being only a one-year running back at SMU, it’s going to be, man, you got to get this down fast track because the protections are way more complicated than college. nothing against college coaching or but it’s just different and in the NFL how sophisticated it’s getting with pass rush and coverage and in the NFL uh you know spags we all talk about how sophisticated his approach is as a running back you better understand protections I keep going back to some JP perin earholding Derwin James in an A gap blitz or Patrick Mahomes might have been destroyed and so that’s that’s going to be something he’s not going to catch on right way, but you can see the ability for him to be an impact player out of the backfield catching the ball. That’s one of the areas that Carson Steel made this team last year. Remember his uh pass pro battles with Drew Tranquil in training camp? It was like epic. It was like a mustsee TV. Like him and Drew Tranquil going headto-head in pass pro. Carson really improved in pass over the course of his offseason training program with us last year. And that will be the the deal for Smith as well. But at least he was able to show off in a passing camp that he’s a former receiver and that he could catch the football. He was getting a bunch of targets out of the back field. U kind of different levels of the field as well. So his hands are great and that shouldn’t be a surprise. I think he’s going to be a weapon on this team. Again, he’s got to earn it and they’re just in shorts right now. But I was excited by what I saw from him just how he can be like a safety valve like Jerk McKinnon was for us for so long. Uh, and coach Reed even pointed out that because he was asked, “Does Bashard Smith remind you of Jerick McKinnon?” And he’s like, “Ah, kind of.” But like, you know, Jerick’s kind of more of a this kind of runner, Brashad is this way. It’s for us to be like, “This guy kind of reminds me of him, right? So, therefore, he is. They’re different players.” But the way Jerick was able to change the game as an outlet receiver out of the back field, particularly in the red zone, is an area that I think Bashard Smith can help us right away. And we’ll see if he can earn that. But I was impressed with what I saw over the course of last weekend. And we mentioned it in the last episode. His 437 speed makes him immediate candidate to be a returner, especially with the new kickoff rules with the touchbacks go to the 35. There’ll be more returns this year. All right, we’ll close this way because the other category, and there’s 16 of them, but I’ll let you pick one and I’ll pick one. Okay. And I get you get first shot is the UDFA. There’s always someone and you mentioned all the other UDFAs when you talk to the uh uh the banquet on Friday night. You you mentioned all those guys that have been some have become stars, ring of honor players here with the Kansas City Chiefs, undrafted players. You’ll get one and I’ll get one. Who was your UDFA that you’re going he might have a chance to make this team? Before I do that, can I give you one quick fun fact about the try out guys? Sure. Are you familiar with Damen Alford? I’m not. So, he was a receiver out there for us this weekend as a try out player. He’s like 6’6, 215 pounds, runs like a 4-4. He uh originally went to Syracuse, then went to Utah last year. During rookie mini camp, in the middle of rookie mini camp, he was the number one overall pick in the CFL draft. Isn’t that crazy? We had the number one overall pick in the CFL draft during rookie camp. Yeah, he was drafted by the Calgary Stampeders. I thought you would love that. That’s awesome. So, I don’t know if he’ll stick here. Uh, he might go to the Calgary Stampeders for all I know. But just know that forever that if you’re ever watching the CFL, that guy was in our Chiefs rookie mini camp. All right. To answer your question, my guy is Jake Brennsttool, a tight end out of Clemson. You’ve probably heard a lot about him if you’re following uh the Chiefs undrafted free agent class and what happened here this weekend because I’ve been posting about him a lot. He just really stood out and looked the part. uh he made a handful of leaping spinning catches deep downfield despite like sticky coverage and defenders all around him in traffic. Like he made a couple of plays on Sunday when I was watching where I wrote down, “Wow, that’s the best play of the day.” And then he had another play where I’m like, “Actually, that’s the best play of the day.” Like he was just really, really impressive. And I think he fits really well in coach Reed’s offense because he’s this classic kind of move tight end sort of player where more than 60% of his career snaps at Clemson were run out of the slot. So he’s not like a traditional big lumbering Blake Bell kind of type. He’s more of a Travis Kelce Noah Gray sort of player. Um he’s like 240 lb. That’s a great comp. Yeah, Dalton Concade is a great comp. Um and he had great production during his career at Clemson. last two years combined he had 99 catches for over a thousand yards and 12 touchdowns. If you look at the Chief’s depth chart at tight end, I think he has a real chance to stick just because of course you have Travis and Noah. I’m not quite sure where Jared Wigh’s progress is on his injury. Um I don’t know if he’ll be ready for camp. I don’t know that. Maybe he will be. But regardless that fourth tight end spot, if you include WY as a third tight end, it’s Robert Tanyion, it’s Trey Watson, another UDFA, and it’s Jake Brittingtool. So, I think he has a real chance to make this team. Got to keep it going here into OTAAS and training camp, but I came away even more impressed than maybe what I was expecting going in. Like, he really stood out to me. Yeah. And mine would be such a long shot to make the team, but he looks like a practice squad guy to me that could end up helping because he gets so many reps. Was Elijah Young, the old Missouri Tiger, then went to Western Kentucky. Went to Western Kentucky and blew it up. He had a big He had a big year for the Hill last year a big year for the Hill Toppers and and again just take this with a grain of salt because that running back room is is going to be crowded. We just went through Smith and you just mentioned Carson Steel. We know the other guys who are there. Um just saw Kareem Han a little bit. Fist pump, hugged him. Um and we know about Pop Pacheco. But it was like okay, who’s this guy? Because he kind of had an idea of what he was doing and got a lot of reps. Yeah. So, he becomes a guy at least you watch at camp and going hm um either keep him on your database at the very least or a practice squad guy and one of those guys if there’s a rash of injuries or whatever that pops up in November, December. But it was one to bring back for Missou fans going, “Oh yeah, that guy.” It’s one of those things where with the transfer rules now, we see a lot of players from smaller programs transferring to big programs, but in this case, you might look at him differently because he was in a crowded running back room at Missou and then went to Western Kentucky. So, he was like an SEC caliber running back that just wanted more opportunities and I can’t fault him for that. And he made the most of it at Western Kentucky for sure. So, yeah, I mean, he looked good. Again, it’s difficult uh for running backs in this camp. Like really, all you can do is I guess some pass pro, but not really. And you can catch the football and you could do mental reps in rookie mini camp. You can’t be running between the tackles. Not a lot of nine on seven with pads on going on during this time of year. But still, he looked the part and yeah, we’ll see what he can do in training camp. And I don’t even know is it Ple or P? The kid from Wazu is Isa Ple. Ple. So Issa Pole is another one you’re going hm because there’s always an undrafted free agent lineman that pops up somewhere practice squad or otherwise and highly regarded at Wazu. So we’ll see. And Elijah Badger is an interesting one too wide receiver flash. He did I mean Badger led uh ASU Arizona State and receiving two years in a row then transferred to Florida for last year. Led Florida in receiving. So really productive player at some big programs during his college career. And also if you look at the receiver depth chart for the Chiefs, I know we talk a lot about how we’re so loaded there now, and I really do believe we are, but there might be a real battle for that fifth or sixth receiver spot, uh, when you really break it all down. So I think Eliza Badger, um, if he can prove it over the course of the offseason training program, actually has a chance. We’ll see what he can do on special teams, too. Yeah, former college teammate of Norman Lot when they were both at Arizona State and then transferred to other schools, Tennessee and Florida, respectively. But rookie mini camps over. Yep, you can you can overdo it when you analyze it. But I think we can all come to the agreement that it’s OEI. It’s orientation. It’s evaluation. It’s installation.

Voice of the Chiefs Mitch Holthus and Senior Team Reporter Matt McMullen break down Chiefs’ rookie minicamp as the players return to the team facility for the offseason training program.

0:00 | Football is (kind of) Back!
3:46 | Around the World
6:26 | Rookie Minicamp Recap

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