How Orlando Brown’s free agency has a ripple effect on KC Chiefs’ offseason plans
One year ago, as the Chiefs examined their own roster to formulate offseason blueprints, every road map began with an offensive line overhaul.
A year later, the offensive line remains the first offseason priority.
But just one member of it in particular: Orlando Brown.
As part of an end-of-season news conference Tuesday, Chiefs general manager Brett Veach outlined a list of the team’s offseason objectives — from improving the defensive line to finding something suitable with free agent Tyrann Mathieu to the potential luxury of more weapons for Patrick Mahomes — but the first domino is figuring out where Brown fits into the equation.
Where.
Not if.
“We expect him to be our left tackle moving forward,” Veach said.
The question is in what manner does Brown’s contract fall onto the Chiefs’ books.
The rest of the offseason will be framed around its answer.
The Chiefs could opt to use the franchise tag on Brown leading up to the NFL’s free agency period, which would cost in the neighborhood of $16.5 million for the 2022 season. Or they could find an agreeable long-term deal that spreads out his guaranteed money. Or they could do both — first a franchise tag, and then later a long-term deal during the negotiation window that stretches into the summer.
The deadline to place the franchise tag on a player is March 8. The Chiefs would not be hesitant to utilize the option for Brown after relinquishing serious draft capital to acquire him last April, days before the NFL Draft.
They sent a first-, third-, two fourth- and a fifth-round pick to the Ravens in exchange for Brown and a second-and sixth-round pick. You don’t usually make that kind of trade with the intentions of it being a one-year rental.
Brown sought to move on from Baltimore in order to play left tackle. The Ravens had him stationed on the the right. The Chiefs offered him the opportunity to protect Patrick Mahomes’ blind side.
“When you have a player come in here — and I think he loves being here and the coaching staff and the personnel staff feel the same way — I think it’s always easier to get something done when players see a place like Kansas City as a long-term place for them to potentially start and finish their career,” Veach said. “So you get a guy like that (from the trade), and I think everything he wanted from his experience in regards to playing left tackle, playing in Kansas City, playing with Pat Mahomes.
“Now I haven’t asked him this directly, but I would venture to say that’s been exactly what he’s wanted. And I think we’ve been looking for a tough, rugged, dependable left tackle to protect Pat Mahomes. So I think when you have that scenario play out where the player loves the team and the team loves the player, I think things are always more likely to get worked out. We hope that element will be something that we iron it and it would be beneficial to use because it allows us to do more things.”
The last sentence is indicative of how Brown’s situation will affect the remainder of the offseason plans. Will the Chiefs’ salary cap be inflicted with $16.5 million in 2022 alone? Will they be able to create some additional wiggle room in the short term with a long-term contact? How would a long-term deal figure into the 2023 salary cap and beyond? They’d like to answer those questions before tackling free agency in mid-March.
Brown, in other words, will be the center of the puzzle, with the remaining pieces squeezing around his number, potentially Mathieu included. The Chiefs would prefer to settle their situation at left tackle and then progress to the roster’s other holes.
Stability along the offensive line has only increased in importance after the past two seasons. The Chiefs can point do their injury-riddled o-line as the culprit for a Super Bowl loss in the 2020 season. They can point to the same unit as the most improved on the roster in 2021, finishing with the second-best pass-blocking win rate and third-best run-blocking win rate in the NFL, per ESPN Analytics. (Pro Football Focus graded the Chiefs offensive line third in run blocking and sixth in pass blocking.)
Brown’s arrival played a big factor there. After rarely playing left tackle in Baltimore, the transition to the blind side, along with a new and completely different offensive scheme, required time. But he settled into the role and became more comfortable. He allowed six sacks for the season, according to Pro Football Focus.
He missed only one game — when he injured his calf during pre-game warm-ups in Cincinnati in Week 17.
“I thought Orlando did a great job. He’s another unique character too where when you talk about a culture, when you talk about a guy that does everything the right way, Orlando is in that category,” Veach said. “The guy never misses practices. He’s as dependable as there is. That Cincinnati game that we played in the regular season, it killed him that he couldn’t play; he actually came back on the field and wanted to play with a pulled calf muscle. I think he’s done a great job at left tackle. We’ll certainly work to get him done.”
This story was originally published February 1, 2022 at 12:57 PM.