{"id":158153,"date":"2025-06-25T19:53:09","date_gmt":"2025-06-25T19:53:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/158153\/"},"modified":"2025-06-25T19:53:09","modified_gmt":"2025-06-25T19:53:09","slug":"chiefs-roster-pffs-linebacker-and-defensive-line-rankings-are-now-out","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/158153\/","title":{"rendered":"Chiefs Roster: PFF\u2019s linebacker and defensive line rankings are now out"},"content":{"rendered":"

On Wednesday, the football analytics site Pro Football Focus published their 2025 rankings for two defensive position groups. First, Dalton Wasserman considered the linebacker corps of every NFL team<\/a>, ranking the Kansas City Chiefs<\/a> fourth behind the Philadelphia Eagles<\/a>, Detroit Lions<\/a> and New England Patriots<\/a>.<\/p>\n

4. Kansas City Chiefs<\/p>\n

The Chiefs have several trustworthy players for different linebacker roles. Nick Bolton<\/a> is the leader of the defense, though his PFF grades have declined since his first two excellent seasons. Leo Chenal<\/a> ranks second in the NFL over the past two seasons with a 91.8 PFF run-defense grade. Drue Tranquill<\/a> is a consistent performer who has recorded a 68.8 PFF overall grade across his two years in Kansas City. Special teams ace Jack Cochrane and fifth-round rookie Jeffrey Bassa<\/a> provide additional depth.<\/p>\n

Then Zolt\u00e1n Buday ranked the defensive lines<\/a>, putting Kansas City in the middle of the pack. (The Pittsburgh Steelers<\/a>, Eagles and New York Giants<\/a> topped this list).<\/p>\n

15. Kansas City Chiefs<\/p>\n

Chris Jones<\/a> is arguably the NFL\u2019s premier interior defender<\/a>, furthering a prolific career by earning a position-leading 90.2 PFF overall grade last season. But despite Kansas City\u2019s continuous investments in the defensive line, there is not much talent around him.<\/p>\n

While former first-round pick George Karlaftis<\/a> earned a career-high 69.8 PFF overall grade in 2024, it ranked only 38th among edge defenders. On the other hand, Felix Anudike-Uzomah, who was also a first-round pick, barely got any playing time last season and ranked 70th among edge defenders in PFF overall grade.<\/p>\n

My take<\/p>\n

Wasserman is right that Kansas City\u2019s MIKE linebacker doesn\u2019t have superb PFF grades. But he rightly refers to him as the \u201cleader of the defense.\u201d It is Bolton\u2019s ability to be coordinator Steve Spagnuolo\u2019s on-field leader that makes him worth the three-year, $45 million contract to which the team signed him<\/a> in March. Chenal \u2014 now entering his fourth NFL season \u2014 has steadily improved his play as his defensive use has increased, although he remains a key special-teams player. A year ago, Tranquill signed a three-year deal worth $19 million<\/a> that recognized his versatile play for the Chiefs after inexplicably being released by the Los Angeles Chargers in 2023. And there\u2019s reason to expect that Bassa<\/a> \u2014 a jack-of-all-trades for the Oregon Ducks \u2014 will help maintain the second level of the defense in the years to come.<\/p>\n

If you\u2019ve read Nate Christensen\u2019s excellent analysis published in these pages on Wednesday<\/a>, you shouldn\u2019t be surprised by Buday\u2019s ranking of the Kansas City defensive line. Jones continues to be the unit\u2019s most consistent performer. In the coming season, he\u2019ll need more help to keep the Chiefs\u2019 defense operating at a high level. That should come from Karlaftis \u2014 who might yet end up on a contract year this season \u2014 and Charles Omenihu, who hopes to finally get a full season under his belt with Kansas City<\/a>. Anudike-Uzomah will be facing a do-or-die season, while Danna will also need to step up after a mediocre 2024 campaign. The good news is that with cornerback Kristian Fulton now in the secondary, Spagnuolo may be able to run enough man coverage to give the defensive line enough time to get home \u2014 just as it did in 2023.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"On Wednesday, the football analytics site Pro Football Focus published their 2025 rankings for two defensive position groups.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":158154,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2063],"tags":[357,3367,921,346,1188,7,29,118,110,922,1193,2438,2437,1128,4135,6,907,3464,3252,151,3775,1647,396],"class_list":{"0":"post-158153","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-kansas-city-chiefs","8":"tag-and","9":"tag-are","10":"tag-arrowhead","11":"tag-chiefs","12":"tag-defensive","13":"tag-football","14":"tag-front-page","15":"tag-kansas-city","16":"tag-kansas-city-chiefs","17":"tag-kansas-city-chiefs-news","18":"tag-kansas-city-chiefs-roster","19":"tag-kansascity","20":"tag-kansascitychiefs","21":"tag-line","22":"tag-linebacker","23":"tag-nfl","24":"tag-now","25":"tag-out","26":"tag-pff","27":"tag-pride","28":"tag-rankings","29":"tag-roster","30":"tag-s"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/114745757113328084","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158153","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=158153"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158153\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/158154"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=158153"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=158153"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=158153"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}