Ian Hartitz identifies team needs for the 2025 Kansas City Chiefs going into the NFL Draft and Combine.

The Chiefs were 60 minutes of football away from pulling off the league's first three-peat of the Super Bowl era … before getting smacked 40-22 by the Eagles in a game that wasn't even that close.

Of course, Kansas City was largely playing with fire all season. Obviously bad football teams don't finish 15-2 and win the AFC; just realize there has been at least a little bit of luck in the team winning an NFL-record 17 consecutive one-score games over the past two seasons.

The Chiefs will always have a chance to compete for the Lombardi Trophy as long as Patrick Mahomes is under center, but there is more offseason work to be done here than your usual Super Bowl runner-up.

Today we'll recap some of the good and bad of 2024 before getting into potential offseason injuries to monitor as well as team needs ahead of the 2025 offseason.

As always: It's a great day to be great.

KANSAS CITY CHIEFS 2024 RECAP

  • Record: 15-2 (11.5 preseason win total)
  • Points per game: 22.6 (15th)
  • EPA per dropback: +0.142 (10th)
  • EPA per rush: -0.058 (13th)
  • Points per game allowed: 19.2 (4th)
  • Leading passer: Patrick Mahomes (3,928 pass yards, 26 TD, 11 INT)
  • Leading rusher: Kareem Hunt (200 carries, 728 yards, 7 TD)
  • Leading receiver: Travis Kelce (97 receptions, 823 yards, 3 TD)

What Are The Biggest Needs of the Chiefs Ahead Of 2025?

Team Need No. 1: Running Back

Both Isiah Pacheco and Kareem Hunt struggled mightily to break tackles and push the pile in 2024.

Explosive plays were also a massive issue: Hunt and Pacheco each ranked among the league's bottom-seven RBs in percentage of carries to gain 10-plus yards last season, leading to Chiefs RBs boasting a league-low 2.8% explosive rush rate.

Maybe Pacheco returns with renewed explosiveness; he did break his fibula in Week 2 after all. Either way: More resources are needed inside the league's third-cheapest RB room in terms of current 2025 dollars.

Team Need No. 2: Pass Catcher

The Chiefs' aforementioned lack of explosive ability is a major red flag, but there's also the simple matter of almost everyone other than Xavier Worthy and Rashee Rice hitting free agency. Seriously: Every other WR to earn even 10 targets on the 2024 Chiefs is an unrestricted free agent–and that's aside from Travis Kelce choosing to come back for a 13th season.

ESPN's receiver ratings didn't rank a single Chiefs pass catcher inside their top-60 WRs and TEs in 2024. None ranked inside the top 50 when looking at yards per route run. Worthy and a hopefully healthy Rice are perfectly fine pieces to build around, but more resources are needed in order to make up for the team's ongoing trend of meh free agent signings and mediocre second-round WRs.

Team Need No. 3: Offensive line

Work also needs to be done on defense with starting S Justin Reid and LB Nick Bolton hitting free agency, but it's safe to say protecting Mahomes better is the higher priority after what we saw in the Super Bowl.

Starting RG Trey Smith is apparently coming back on the franchise tag while Mike Caliendo is an ERFA, but the team's tackle play was also unacceptable. 

Creed Humphrey, Joe Thuney, and Smith are a perfectly solid core, and the team can't get out of Taylor's deal until 2026 at the earliest. It's not like a complete revamping is needed here, but at a minimum the team should think long and hard about flowing some additional resources into the room via the NFL Draft: Kansas City hasn't used a top-50 draft pick on an offensive lineman since Mitch Morse all the way back in 2015.

Biggest surprise: RB Kareem Hunt

Hunt has been pulled off the free agency scrap heap a few weeks into the season in back-to-back years, as the former Chiefs/Browns stud has failed to earn much interest on the open market across the league.

Thus, not much was expected from Hunt upon re-joining the Chiefs in Week 3; it wouldn't have shocked the world if Carson Steele and/or Samaje Perine managed to lead the backfield in Isiah Pacheco's absence.

And yet, Hunt had other plans.

Hunt among all RBs in Weeks 4-17:

  • PPR points: 155.4 (RB25)
  • Rush yards: 728 (20th)
  • Rush TD: 7 (tied for 11th)

Not exactly Earth-shattering numbers, and Hunt's lack of long speed didn't help this offense's ongoing obstacle of creating explosive plays, but the man certainly proved to be a useful piece capable of picking up the needed yardage more times than not. Consider: Hunt's 55.5% success rate trailed only Bijan Robinson (60.2%) and Derrick Henry (58.8%) among 31 RBs with at least 150 carries!

Biggest disappointment: The entire passing game

Sure, Xavier Worthy started to flash down the stretch, and Travis Kelce's 97 receptions for 823 yards isn't exactly "bad" even if those numbers are low relative to his usual lofty standards.

But still: This passing game has slipped to 12th and 10th in EPA per dropback over the past two seasons after finishing inside the league's top two in each of the first five seasons of the Mahomes era. That's hardly terrible, but the explosive element of the passing game is another story.

Injuries were certainly a major culprit: Rashee Rice was putting up HUGE numbers before having his season ended by unfortunate friendly fire, and expected starting WR Hollywood Brown was out of commission until late December. Either way: It's clear even the greatest QB of the post-TB12 era needs a bit more help in order to re-reach his previous sky-high heights.

Key injuries

There is one main injury … and off-the-field … concern here: Rashee Rice.

  • Injury: Some learned doctors believe Rice's recovery from LCL/PLC/hamstring injuries could prevent him from being normal until 2026, if ever. However, others believe he could in fact be ready by Week 1.
  • Suspension: It's unclear if the lack of progression here is good news for Rice, or simply the courts being all kinds of backed up. Make sure you follow the great Drew Davenport for future updates on the matter. For now, a multi-game suspension continues to loom stemming from his part in a multi-vehicle accident caused by his reckless driving last offseason.