Loss of Sean Smith hurts, but Chiefs have pieces to fortify secondary

Nearly three weeks into free agency, the Chiefs — who lost starting corner Sean Smith to AFC West rival Oakland and have not re-signed starting safety Husain Abdullah — still haven’t added any depth in the defensive backfield.

But if the Chiefs are indeed done with their significant moves — tagging safety Eric Berry, re-signing linebackers Tamba Hali and Derrick Johnson and adding tackle Mitchell Schwartz certainly fit that description — team chairman Clark Hunt is good with that.

“Yeah, I sure would (be happy if this is it),” Hunt said at the NFL’s annual meeting.” And probably, it comes back to believing that you really build winning football teams through the draft and through retaining your own guys. And I think we’ve done a very good job of that.

“We have added a couple of guys that will help us, and I think John (Dorsey, the Chiefs’ general manager) has shown every year that he’s been here that he’ll find some talented football players as we move forward toward the season who, for whatever reason, weren’t part of the first wave of free agency, and he’ll get those guys signed to the Kansas City Chiefs and will come in and be productive.”

They might need to shop for bargains, considering the Chiefs only have about $5.7 million in cap room remaining, with about half that needed to sign their draft picks. But the good news is that Dorsey’s track record shows an ability to add defensive backs on the cheap who can help them.

Quintin Demps had a four-interception season in Kansas City in 2013, and Kurt Coleman intercepted three passes with the Chiefs the next year. Tyvon Branch signed with the Cardinals after a solid season as the Chiefs’ third safety this past season. All were signed to one-year “prove-it” deals, and they drove up their value enough during their short stints with the Chiefs to find greener pastures elsewhere.

But even if Dorsey’s remarkable run of finding cheap, effective defensive backs comes to an end this year, the Chiefs do have some young, homegrown players in the cupboard who they invested either premium draft picks or dollars in.

For instance, 2015 first-round pick Marcus Peters, the NFL’s defensive rookie of the year, appears to be more than ready to assume Smith’s role of No. 1 cornerback.

“Expectations are going to be high, but it’s going to be different — that’s just the game of ball,” Peters said at the 101 Awards. “Hell, yeah, if I can get eight picks again, let’s do it, you know? But I’m shooting for more. Eight picks, you know, that’s just the start … . I’m going to continue to have fun with it … and go win some games with my teammates.”

Chiefs coach Andy Reid said Peters did a nice job with all the responsibility they gave him this past year.

“He handled things the right way, and we’ll just see, we’ll see how it all works,” Reid said.

At the awards press conference, Peters thanked the team for taking a chance on him in the first round after he was dismissed from Washington his final year due to repeated run-ins with the coaching staff. But Reid said the Chiefs had a pretty good idea of who he was, and were comfortable with taking him.

“Well, we thought we narrowed the risk by doing our homework,” Reid said. “ … He’s got an explosive personality, which is a good thing — that’s what makes him so competitive. He’ll grow as time goes on into knowing when to allow that to happen and when not to allow it to happen. You saw it this year.

“I mean, you saw him do some great things. The sky is the limit for him. As far as being a risk, I thought we’d narrowed it down to a slight risk, and I thought he handled himself well.”

That’s not to say Peters, who made the Pro Bowl as a rookie, doesn’t have room for improvement.

“Well, the double moves were the things that got him a little bit,” Reid said. “And they got him at the Pro Bowl with (it) a little bit. So he’ll get better. He’s got great anticipation and instincts, and just the more he sees it, the better he will be.

“The one thing I love about him is that if he makes a mistake, he comes back at ya like 110 miles an hour. So I love that. He’s got a great memory, and for that position, you have to do that, you have to have that.”

As things currently stand, it will be interesting to see who ends up at the opposite corner. Phillip Gaines, a third-round pick in 2014, showed promise before he tore his ACL last September, while 2015 third-round pick Steven Nelson still has to prove himself after a rookie year in which he was learning the defense and rarely got on the field.

There’s also, of course, the chance the Chiefs will take a cornerback early in the draft. ESPN draft guru Todd McShay had Houston corner William Jackson III going to them in his last mock draft.

At safety, the Chiefs will presumably have star Eric Berry in the fold — both sides want to get a long-term deal done — while Ron Parker is a starting-caliber safety who signed a five-year, $30 million extension in 2014 and brought some sorely-needed stability to the nickel corner position after Gaines got hurt last year.

Daniel Sorensen, an undrafted free agent in 2014, earned the staff’s trust, receiving 240 defensive snaps in 2015, according to Pro Football Focus. Special-teams ace and occasional defensive contributor Jamell Fleming (157 defensive snaps in 2015) is making the move to safety.

The Chiefs could also add depth to the position by re-signing Abdullah, who had 29 tackles in 2015, or drafting a player at the position. They had formal interviews with at least two safeties at the NFL Combine, which has been an indicator of interest based on the Chiefs’ past behavior.

However it ends up shaking out, Hunt is confident in his front office and coaching staff. Since Reid and Dorsey arrived in 2013, Hunt has consistently stated that he expects the team to build on what it accomplished the previous season.

Considering the Chiefs rebounded from a miserable 1-5 start to go 11-5 and reach the AFC Divisional Round in 2015, that means the bar for 2016 is now the AFC Championship Game, right?

“Well, the expectations are higher than that — the expectations are to win championships,” Hunt said. “We’ve built a team over the last several years that has a chance at that.

“I’m certainly never going to put a bar out there for the guys now, or when you ask me the question right before the season,” Hunt said with a chuckle, preparing for the punch line. “But I am gonna set a bar on the first six games, that we’re going to be better than 1-5.”

This story was originally published March 27, 2016 at 6:17 PM with the headline "Loss of Sean Smith hurts, but Chiefs have pieces to fortify secondary."