Who are the Chiefs rookies? Meet the 2025 players trying to make the roster
Training camp is underway for the Kansas City Chiefs as they look to rebound from losing Super Bowl LIX. Fans heading to St. Joseph to watch the team prepare for the 2025 season will see a bunch of new faces mixing it up with Patrick Mahomes, Travis Kelce, Chris Jones, with many of them looking to earn a spot on the team.
The team selected seven players in the 2025 NFL Draft, and signed 16 undrafted rookies as free agents to compete for one of the 53 active roster spots and 10 practice squad spots. Most of the time, fans will only see them with a helmet on, but we dug a little deeper to find out quick facts about those players.
Some of the undrafted rookies signed have already been released ahead of the final cuts on Tuesday, Aug. 27. and before the first preseason game on Saturday, Aug. 9. This means there are 19 rookies to learn about. Here are some fun facts about the Chiefs’ rookie class of 2025.
Josh Simmons
The Chiefs’ first-round selection is a left tackle out of Ohio State.
On top of showing some fighting spirit with fellow rookie Ashton Gillotte, Simmons comes from a professional sports family. His father, Nelson Simmons, is a former Major League Baseball outfielder, playing 100 games in three seasons from 1984 to 1987. His uncle, Chris Fuamatu-Maʻafala, is a former NFL fullback who played for the Pittsburgh Steelers and Jacksonville Jaguars.
Omarr Norman-Lott
Norman-Lott plays defensive tackle and was selected in the second round by the Chiefs. He started his college career at Arizona State, where he was recruited as a four-star player from Sacramento, California. He transferred to the University of Tennessee in 2023 and finished his college career as a Volunteer.
During his time in college, he majored in communication studies.
Ashton Gillotte
Drafted in the third round, Gillotte was born in Ohio but moved to Boca Raton, Florida, as a child.
The defensive end said his uncle is a Chiefs fan who called Gillotte playing for the team from the very beginning, according to an interview with the team. However, he’s not sure how his uncle became a fan of the Chiefs.
Nohl Williams
Also taken in the third round, the Chiefs traded up to take Williams, who plays cornerback. He led the FBS (NCAA’s top subdivision) in interceptions with seven during the 2024 season for UCLA, and returned one for a touchdown.
Before he transferred to UCLA, he played at UNLV, where he intercepted then-Arizona State quarterback Jayden Daniels, who now plays for the Washington Commanders. He’ll have another chance at it Oct. 27, when Washington plays Kansas City.
Jalen Royals
Royals comes from Utah State and was selected in the fourth round by the Chiefs. The wide receiver is listed at 6-feet-tall and 205 pounds and was a three-sport star at Hillgrove High School in Powder Springs, Georgia, lettering in football, basketball and track and field.
He said he’s thrilled to join the Chiefs.
“Man, that culture over there, that winning culture (excites me),” Royals said to the Deseret News in April. “They’ve been to the Super Bowl many times and won many times too. I just know walking into that I need to be about my business, lock in and embrace the Kansas City culture.”
Jeff Bassa
The linebacker was taken in the fifth round by Kansas City and played college football at Oregon. He wasn’t always a linebacker, as he originally played safety and wide receiver for Kearns High School in Salt Lake City.
He was recruited by schools all over the country, including Arizona, Arizona State, Baylor, Hawaii, Kansas, Louisville, Oklahoma State, Oregon State, Syracuse, UNLV, Utah, Utah State and Washington State. He was also on the Chiefs’ radar for multiple seasons in case he decided to leave school early to head to the pros, Chiefs national scout Jonathan Howard said.
Brashard Smith
The Chiefs’ seventh round pick, Smith is a running back from SMU whose 1,977 all-purpose yards ranked fourth in the FBS in 2024. He wasn’t always a running back, and the inspiration for his position switch from wide receiver came after watching Chiefs running back Isiah Pacheco in action.
SMU coach Rhett Lashlee said to ESPN that he was watching a Chiefs game and saw Pacheco was playing great. He texted running backs coach Kyle Cooper about the performance and asking about Smith
“I remember texting Coop during the game and being like, ‘Hey, how much does Brashard weigh?’,” Lashlee said. “He hit me back and it was like 10 pounds less than Pacheco.”
Elijhah Badger
Badger is a wide receiver from Florida, who transferred to the Gators after being the leading receiver for Arizona State in 2022 and 2023. He continued that leading streak at Florida with 806 receiving yards during the 2024 season.
Jake Briningstool
The 6’5”, 241-pound tight end comes from Clemson and was ranked the No. 1 tight end in high school in the nation and the No. 1 prospect in the state of Tennessee by 247 Sports in 2021.
Chiefs coach Andy Reid called Briningstool personally to discuss future plans after the draft concluded and he was left undrafted, he said.
“Just talking to Coach Reid on the phone, I think he laid out a great plan for me. Just the situation, being able to come in here and learn from a great tight end room, and just be able to take full advantage of that opportunity,” Briningstool said in May. “I think also, this offense, I think it fits my skill-set, stuff I do really well. So I’m glad to be here and excited to go to work.”
Dalton Cooper
An offensive lineman from Oklahoma State, he started his college career at Texas State, where he started 36 games from 2020-2022. In his final season at Oklahoma State, Cooper didn’t allow a single sack in 285 pass-blocking snaps.
Jacobe Covington
A USC cornerback, he majored in American Popular Culture while at the university. He appeared in 42 games during his college career at Washington and USC, starting in 14 games.`
Mac Dalena
The wide receiver spent most of his college career on special teams at Fresno State. In 2024, his lone season as a full-time wide receiver, he totaled 64 catches for 1,065 yards and eight touchdowns.
He’s also married, tying the knot with Mikayla Dalena on April 5.
Brandon George
He played 717 total snaps at linebacker for Pittsburgh in 2024, finishing with 80 tackles, 5 1/2 tackles-for-loss and three forced fumbles.
The Pennsylvania born-and-raised native also hosts a virtual auction and donation service for the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center’s Children’s Hospital.
Kevin Knowles
This cornerback from Florida State stands at 5’10”, and the Chiefs say his 41-inch vertical jump at his pro day would have led all cornerbacks at the NFL Scouting Combine in 2025.
Glendon Miller
The Maryland safety mostly played in the slot. He had 39 tackles and three interceptions during his 2024 season. He was one of six players from Maryland selected in the 2025 NFL Draft, tied for the most in one year in school history.
Maryland coach Michael Locksley once called Miller the team’s “swiss army knife,” meaning he can fill any role asked of him.
Esa Pole
An offensive lineman coming out of Washington State, the 6’5”, 323-pound athlete didn’t start playing football until 2021. While some might see that as a negative, Pole said on the “Bootleg Football” podcast in April that it helped him out.
“A lot of people might see that as a deficit of mine, being new to the game,” Pole said. “But being able to learn a sport at the college level, you don’t develop a lot of bad habits that you might develop in high school, or in middle school, like some nicks and knacks you have to rip over just to fix it.”
Melvin Smith Jr.
This cornerback from Southern Arkansas started all four years at college and is a speedster. He had a 100-yard pick-six in 2023, and a 99-yard kickoff return for a touchdown in 2024.
He was the only NCAA Division II college athlete to be invited to the Senior Bowl in 2025.
Tre Watson
The tight end finished his college career at Texas A&M after three years at Fresno State. The rookie shared some of the reasoning behind why the Chiefs decided to sign him in April to KRQE-TV in New Mexico.
“You know, multiple teams had draft grades on me, and obviously my name didn’t get called, but I am looking forward to this opportunity in Kansas City,” Watson said. “They really enjoy that I am a hybrid tight end, my body size fits to where I can hold my own in the blocking game, and ... I can run fast enough to run routes and get open.”
Elijah Young
The running back played three years at Missouri before transferring to Western Kentucky to finish his college career. In his two seasons at Western Kentucky, he totaled 1,357 rushing yards.
Outside of the football field, he’s a member of the Omega Psi Phi fraternity, a historically African-American fraternity and the first international fraternal organization founded on a historically black college campus.
This story was originally published August 2, 2025 at 9:51 AM.
