The Chiefs are without two starting corners. How they manage to keep getting by
Regular meetings separate Chiefs players based on position, same as every other team, and eventually those rooms take on their own personalities. Position coaches develop mottos for their groups. They repeat motivational phrases. They echo reminders over and over again.
In training camp, the secondary latched onto a specific one.
“Stay ready. So you don’t have to get ready.”
How fitting.
While the Chiefs have largely avoided the rash of absences to engross the NFL, the secondary serves as the exception. One of their starters from last year’s Super Bowl, Bashaud Breeland, opened the season on a four-game suspension that stretches through Monday’s game against the Patriots. That left Charvarius Ward and rookie L’Jarius Sneed as the starters on the outside, and both have fractured bones in the first three weeks.
Sneed will miss some time with a fractured clavicle. Ward missed one week with a fractured hand but returned in Week 3 — with a cast wrapping the hand.
“Things happen. You look around the landscape of the league right now, there’s a lot of guys going down,” Chiefs defensive backs coach Sam Madison said. “We’re just picking up the pieces when they do fall. We’re going to rely on these corners. Coach (Steve Spagnuolo) is not going to change his defensive concepts. He’s going to put these guys in position to challenge themselves.”
The absences have been plentiful at cornerback — the top-three men on the depth chart have missed time — but the secondary hasn’t missed a beat. The Chiefs have allowed 608 passing yards this season, fourth lowest in football. Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson managed only 97 yards Monday, even though he attempted 27 passes.
The Chiefs bypassed a reactionary roster move, instead riding it out with the guys they got, with Breeland eligible to return from his suspension next week. Rashad Fenton has filled in on the outside, and Madison called his play “phenomenal.”
But the success revolves around a player on the roster not even listed as a cornerback.
Tyrann Mathieu.
The leader of the Chiefs defense, technically a safety, became more and more versatile as last season progressed in Spagnuolo’s defense, and he’s rolled that over into 2020. He’s played more snaps at slot cornerback than anywhere else this season — 86 of them in the past two weeks alone, according to Pro Football Focus.
The Chiefs are playing most snaps — even passing downs — with just two true cornerbacks on the field.
Kind of.
“We have another corner that’s playing safety in Tyrann,” Madison said. “So it’s really fun to be able to put him in a different position and being able to have that hybrid-type player.”
Adapt and adjust. A sixth-round pick in 2019, Fenton actually played inside corner more than anywhere else as a rookie. But with the injuries —first to Ward and now to Sneed — he’s shifted outside the hashmarks.
It’s been a patchwork solution, one that could be further tested Monday even though starting QB Cam Newton is out. The Patriots’ coaching staff is known to exploit weaknesses.
A team playing without two of its top-three cornerbacks? That would qualify.
Usually.
“We’ve thrown a lot of different things at these guys, and they just respond,” Madison said. “... They know they’re going to be relied on a lot, playing man-to-man and playing different zones and all the different things we do. They’re up to the challenge. That’s the one great thing — they never back down from a challenge.”
This story was originally published October 2, 2020 at 5:00 AM.