The Kansas City Chiefs are asking a lot of Anthony Hitchens. But not all on the field
Late last season, during a film session with his defense, Chiefs defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo showed a clip of a play from the previous day’s practice. Well, it wasn’t even a play, actually. Spagnuolo highlighted something he spotted before the snap, centering on one player.
Linebacker Anthony Hitchens had tapped a defensive lineman to move his positioning. He’d then briefly turned backward to the secondary and offered some directions. It was apparent he knew everyone’s assignment, and that’s where Spagnuolo placed his emphasis.
“He’s the glue,” Spagnuolo said.
The Chiefs are leaning on that now in more ways than ever. In two consecutive drafts, they’ve used a second-round pick on a linebacker. In 2020, they took Willie Gay Jr. from Mississippi State at 63rd overall. And last month, they picked Nick Bolton from Missouri at 58th overall, their first selection in the 2021 NFL Draft.
They’ve made a point to replenish the linebacker room, where they’d like to get younger, faster and more athletic.
The sooner the better. A year ago, Gay didn’t have the benefit of the offseason workout programs, limited instead to virtual learning during the COVID-19 restrictions. As Chiefs coaches talked about drawbacks of missing on-field work, they often pointed to players like Gay. This week, as they returned to the field as part of organized team activities, Hitchens is part of teaching crew.
“He’s been great for the young guys. I think he does a heck of a job with that,” Chiefs coach Andy Reid said. “He was great with Willie last year. He’ll be good with the young guy this year. He knows he’s a good football player and is very confident that way as a veteran.”
The role comes naturally, Hitchens said, a quality he began to mold when he was a younger player in Dallas and had veterans willing to offer advice. He’s never forgotten that.
With Hitchens, the advice surfaces on the field, to be sure, but also in meetings and with one-on-one conversations off to the side. Sometimes, it comes through a phone call or text message. He’s already learned, for example, that Bolton prefers to see things with his own eyes — on the field. “He’s not big on taking notes,” as Hitchens framed it. He’d prefer to do a walk-through at practice. So Hitchens has taken the extra time to do that.
“Honestly, it’s just being me studying —and if they need help, they can ask. I just give advice and try to teach them the pros and the cons of playing linebacker and being in the NFL,” Hitchens said. “I’m just like a big brother to all of them. We are all family here and just trying to get everybody to improve so that we can be as good as we can in our linebacker room, as a defense and as a team.”
A big brother? Actually, he’s more like the grandfather of the group, Reid joked.
That’s a label he would probably prefer not stick. So as the Chiefs are remaking their linebacker depth chart, Hitchens is remaking himself. He’s become more slender this offseason, visible even on the other side of a Zoom call with the media this week.
In a league that continues its decades-long trend to speed, Hitchens is often removed on third downs. He played just 56% of the defensive snaps in 2020, down from 63% in 2019 and 80% in 2018, his first season of a five-year contract with the Chiefs. He’d like to change that and one solution, he figures, is becoming lighter on his feet this summer.
He’ll ramp back up the bulk weight exercises during the season. Maybe keep up with his two younger teammates along the way.
“I’m just watching the body fat. It’s no secret —I’m in Year Eight; I can’t do what I did three, four years ago,” he said. “So I’m just trying to lean out, watch my diet and just keep working. Try different things and hopefully it works for my body.
“Everybody’s different. This is something different that I’m trying this year.”