{"id":872770,"date":"2026-04-23T13:36:51","date_gmt":"2026-04-23T13:36:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/872770\/"},"modified":"2026-04-23T13:36:51","modified_gmt":"2026-04-23T13:36:51","slug":"staff-predictions-for-the-chiefs-on-day-1-of-the-2026-nfl-draft","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/872770\/","title":{"rendered":"Staff predictions for the Chiefs on Day 1 of the 2026 NFL Draft"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup _1teeyfa8 ls9zuh1\">Through all the smokescreens and cliches, I believed Brett Veach at his Combine press conference when he <a href=\"https:\/\/www.arrowheadpride.com\/kansas-city-chiefs-news\/194956\/chiefs-brett-veach-breaks-down-draft-philosophy-combine\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">explained how difficult it is to \u201cfind\u201d the worthwhile players at premium positions<\/a>. He named defensive linemen as an example, but the \u201cpremium\u201d tag extends to offensive tackles, wide receivers and cornerbacks, as well as quarterbacks. He made the point that they \u201cdon\u2019t really become available in free agency.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup _1teeyfa8 ls9zuh1\">Veach backed up this logic by using free agency to strengthen the team\u2019s non-premium positions, with running back Kenneth Walker III and safety Alohi Gilman. That sets up the premium positions as the team\u2019s focus at the top of the draft.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup _1teeyfa8 ls9zuh1\">Among the \u201cpremium\u201d positions Veach could be eyeing at pick No. 9, cornerback is simply not treated that way by the organization. I think it\u2019s safe to eliminate that as one of the possibilities with the first pick.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup _1teeyfa8 ls9zuh1\">My prediction: the Chiefs invest in two of the remaining three premium positions of need with the two Day 1 selections. Two of these three will be picked by Kansas City on Day 1:<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup _1teeyfa8 ls9zuh1\">Defensive end Rueben Bain Jr.<br \/>Right tackle Blake Miller, Clemson<br \/>One of the many wide receivers projected to go on Day 1<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Through all the smokescreens and cliches, I believed Brett Veach at his Combine press conference when he explained&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":872771,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2063],"tags":[346,7,118,110,923,2438,2437,6],"class_list":{"0":"post-872770","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-kansas-city-chiefs","8":"tag-chiefs","9":"tag-football","10":"tag-kansas-city","11":"tag-kansas-city-chiefs","12":"tag-kansas-city-chiefs-draft","13":"tag-kansascity","14":"tag-kansascitychiefs","15":"tag-nfl"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116454296403770488","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/872770","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=872770"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/872770\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/872771"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=872770"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=872770"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=872770"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}