The Kansas City Chiefs are relying on right tackle Jaylon Moore to protect star quarterback Patrick Mahomes despite his poor metrics last year.
The Kansas City Chiefs may have had a terrible season in 2025, one in which the team missed the playoffs for the first time in 11 years, but the team should be improved and figures to be a contender once again.
The Chiefs being contenders again is contingent on how star quarterback Patrick Mahomes plays coming off the worst injury of his career, but even if it takes him some time to get back to the guy everyone knows he can be, the offense should take a step in the right direction.
Super Bowl Most Valuable Player and now starting running back of the Chiefs, Kenneth Walker III, will provide Kansas City’s backfield with burst and shiftiness that it severely lacked in 2025.
Walker rushed for over 1,000 yards in a split backfield with Zach Charbonnet and displayed his ability to carry a team when it needed him most when Charbonnet went down with a season-ending injury early in the playoffs.
Walker will be a nice crutch for the Chiefs offense as Mahomes gets back up to speed, but Kansas City will need better contributions from their receiving room that was among the league leaders in drops. I don’t expect that group to struggle as bad as they did in 2025, but their success is pertinent to the team’s success.
Also pertinent to the team’s success is how well the offensive line plays. The offensive line is led by center Creed Humphrey, guard Trey Smith and left tackle Josh Simmons, who all performed well in 2025 but had to make up for inconsistent play from the right tackle position.
The duo of Jaylon Moore and Jawaan Taylor were underwhelming – Moore signed a big deal and only started six games while Taylor was the most penalized tackle in football.
Pro Football Focus’ (PFF) Bradley Locker deemed Moore as one of 10 make-or-break players in 2026, citing his performance as a key indicator of whether the Chiefs offense can be better than it was last year.
“Appearing on a career-high 427 snaps while starters dealt with injury, Moore compiled a 63.1 overall PFF grade,” Locker wrote Wednesday. “The former [San Francisco] 49er was at his worst in pass protection, allowing 27 pressures on only 257 opportunities — good for a 93.8 pass-blocking efficiency score, tied for the eighth-worst among qualified tackles.”
With Taylor now on the Atlanta Falcons, Moore will be the clear-cut starter and has to be better than he was last year. Mahomes will be putting a lot of trust in a guy who isn’t known for being a good pass protector.
