Patrick

Mahomes

“Once you start the clock, then the clock’s got to be rolling,” Reid said Saturday. “You just have to evaluate what you want to do there. But he’s in a position where he can do everything, I think.” The timing (Week 15) and severity of Mahomes’ injury would typically have a player in real danger of missing the following season’s opener, but the regular rules have rarely applied to Mahomes. Reid’s quotes suggest this time will be no different. Mahomes will probably still begin training camp on the active/PUP list, but at this point we would probably put his odds of being ready for the opener greater than 50 percent.

Mahomes has a chance to return in time for Week 1 after suffering season-ending ACL and LCL tears last year. It sounds like the plan is to rely on the run game and the defense for the first half of the season, as Mahomes “is working back from that injury.” For those concerned that the Chiefs might stick with that game plan all year, Veach adds that he hopes by “mid-season [or] late season, Pat’s in that groove and we have this thing cooking.” We believe he’s saying that the Chiefs intend to increase their passing frequency as the season progresses and we will continue to monitor Mahomes’ offseason participation. For now, RB Kenneth Walker looks like a safe bet to handle a hefty workload this year.

Kansas City, Breech said, “should be the first team to give them a call about making a possible deal” for Pitts, who is reportedly on the trade block, per ESPN’s Adam Schefter. “The Chiefs currently have two first-round picks heading into the draft and they would likely be able to get a deal done by sending just one of those to Atlanta.” Breech said dealing Pitts, entering his age-26 season, would free up some much-needed salary cap space for the Falcons and give them a first-round draft pick, which they do not have at the moment. Pitts, Breech said, would be the “heir apparent” to Travis Kelce, 36, who re-signed with the Chiefs last month after briefly considering retirement for a third straight offseason. Pitts in 2025 had 88 receptions for 928 yards and five touchdowns, a career season. KC last year ranked 11th in two tight end usage (28 percent).

Kansas City holds the ninth pick in the first round of the draft. Kiper rightly points out that the Chiefs very much need to bolster their wideout room after Xavier Worthy’s 2025 struggles, Travis Kelce’s age-based decline, and Rashee Rice’s various and disturbing off-the-field issues. Tyson struggled with injuries in college, missing nearly a third of his collegiate games. He remains a solid prospect with tantalizing upside, however. In 2024, when he went for 1,101 yards and ten touchdowns, Tyson had the seventh-highest yards per route run in the nation, playing from both the boundary and the slot. He could be a difference maker in a KC offense in need of a downfield playmaker. “I’m already picturing Mahomes buying time in the pocket and firing 50-50 balls to Tyson in the end zone,” Kiper said.

It was reported last week that the Chiefs are hopeful Mahomes would participate in OTAs in May, even if on a limited basis. While that may still be the case, when speaking at the Annual League Meeting in Phoenix on Saturday, Reid opted to play things close to the vest. The 68-year-old coach said Mahomes is in the building seven hours a day and that it’s clear from the progress he has made in his recovery. That said, he also offered up a simple “we’ll just see where it goes from there,” in regards to Mahomes’ return. The Chiefs went out and acquired Justin Fields from the Jets earlier this month, and he’s expected to see plenty of first-team reps in Mahomes’ absence. We’ll likely get a better sense of Mahomes’ availability after the draft when OTAs ramp up.

The limited capacity is probably the key bit of this, but Mahomes has seemed well ahead of projections for his recovery from a torn ACL and LCL for some time and at this point it probably shouldn’t be surprising if he’s ready for Week 1. The first real logistical checkpoint we’ll see for Mahomes — since voluntary offseason practice isn’t heavily tracked and we’ll have no clue how ahead he is outside of optimistic quotes — is if he’s placed on the physically unable to perform list as he reports to training camp. We don’t have a reason to believe he will be at this point.

Speaking on the Rich Eisen Show on ESPN, Albert Breer reported that the hope in Kansas City is that Patrick Mahomes is “close to being himself” by Week 1 of the coming season. Well, that doesn’t sound promising. Mahomes didn’t have surgery on his torn ACL until the middle of December, with most athletes in the league today requiring a 9-12-month recovery timeline. The absolute front end of that window puts him back to football activities in the middle of September, while the back end means Mahomes would be looking at the Physically Unable to Perform list to start the 2026 season. We wouldn’t put it past Mahomes to hit the earlier end of his recovery timetable, but we also wound’t be counting on him for Week 1. Much yet to come out of Kansas City regarding their star quarterback.

Kelce has reportedly been in touch with Andy Reid and the Chiefs in recent weeks after the Chiefs inexplicably missed the postseason. Kelce, 36, has mulled retirement in each of the past three offseasons and seems more serious about the prospect of hanging it up following the disappointment of 2025. “We are prepared for either scenario,” Veach said Tuesday. Kelce caught 76 passes for 851 yards and five touchdowns in 2025. Only five tight ends had more receptions than Kelce and a mere three tight ends had more receiving yards. Kelce ranked 22nd in tight end yards per route run and 14th in yards after the catch per reception.

Per Reid, Mahomes is spending seven hours per day with Chiefs assistant athletic trainer and physical therapist Julie Frymyer. Reid notes that although rehab following a significant knee injury is “not going to be a pleasant thing,” Mahomes keeps showing up and Frymyer continues to challenge him and keeps him “on task.” The positive reports continue to trickle in for the veteran quarterback, who has a chance to be ready for Week 1.

This marks the fourth straight offseason in which the Chiefs have redone Mahomes’ mega-contract to create some cap breathing room. This most recent restructure will have Mahomes’ cap hit go from $78.2 million to $34.65 million for the 2026 season. Mahomes’ cap number for the 2027 season will now be over $85 million, according to Over The Cap’s Jason Fitzgerald. Mahomes, entering his age-31 season, is hoping to be ready for Week 1 after suffering a late-season knee injury.