KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Last Thursday, Miami defensive lineman Reuben Bain Jr. walked through the doors of the Chiefs’ training complex, one of dozens of college prospects passing through Kansas City on their way to the 2026 NFL Draft.
“It’s part of the process,” Chiefs General Manager Brett Veach said Thursday during a pre-draft Zoom press conference. “Needless to say we spent a lot of time with him at the combine, brought him here, had a lot of meetings with a lot of different people and that process is consistent with not just him but with all of our players that we bring here and that we have on our draft board.”
It’s an annual rite of spring at NFL facilities, but prospects at the level of Bain, who is considered a likely top-10 selection in next week’s draft, aren’t necessarily a normal sight in Kansas City in the weeks leading up to the draft. NFL teams are allowed 30 visits in person with draft-eligible players at their facilities. The players can’t work out on the football field, but they can meet with coaches, front office personnel and medical staff.
During the lead up to the 2017 draft, the Chiefs brought Patrick Mahomes in for a secretive visit and had him diagramming plays on the whiteboard. Last spring, Joshua Simmons went through an array of examinations to assuage concerns about his surgially repaired left patellar tendon.
These are often referred to as “top-30 visits,” even though there is frequently little if any ranking component to them. The Chiefs under Veach have primarily used them as a tool for researching players who did not appear at the NFL Combine in Indianapolis due to injury or lack of an invitation. The Chiefs signed at least four undrafted free agents from last year’s 30-visit class including offensive tackles Esa Pole and Dalton Cooper, linebacker Brandon George, and cornerback Melvin Smith.
“In the past, picking at 32, we probably spent most of those 30 visits on non-combine players that we wanted to get medicals on,” Veach said. “We spent a lot of our time with those prospects that we felt would be in that 20-40 range at the Combine and having a late pick, I think the numbers that we were looking at were different. I felt we were good with the information we got with those players.”
Holding the No. 9 overall selection this year, however, along with No. 29 overall, has adjusted Veach’s priorities on player visits this year.
“The grades are so close now with these guys from say 10-30, 10-35, you want every bit of information you can get,” Veach explained. “We brought in maybe three or four non-combine guys where I think in the past we’ve brought in 10-15 non-combine guys,” Veach said.
The draft composition is also different with fewer quarterback prospects and less defensive tackle talent in the first round than in past drafts. Yet at edge rusher, the stockpile of talent is so deep that the Chiefs put special emphasis on the position, hosting visits from players such as Bain, Ohio State’s Arvell Reese, and Texas Tech’s David Bailey, players who would normally be outside the reach of the Chiefs drafting in the backend of the first round. Veach says the depth of defensive ends could extend into the third round, and the team’s focus on the position reflects that optimism.
“I feel like we’ve brought in every defensive end in the NFL Draft that could be drafted this weekend in, and we must’ve brought in 12 of those guys,” Veach explained. “Again, that’s because grades are so close and you may have the opportunity to get one of those guys at No. 9 and maybe No. 29.”
It’s not just edge rusher either. The Chiefs also reportedly hosted visits from receivers Carnell Tate of Ohio State and USC’s Makai Lemon. The focus on the top half of the draft has come at a cost for a club that has had great success mining the later round of the draft plus the undrafted free agent pool for talent.
“It did take away from our ability to bring in some of those non-combine guys,” said Veach, who added that Vice President of Sports Medicine and Performance Rick Burkholder and his staff have been asked “to do some unorthodox things with some of these later round picks.” That includes working with players, agents and college teams in researching and analyzing medical and performance records.
It’s also forced the club to rely even more on virtual meetings with draft prospects.
“We’re a big Zoom team to begin with, but I feel like this year we have about 15 Zooms a day,” Veach said. I do appreciate the coaches hanging in there with us and giving us all that information we need.”
The makeup of this year’s draft with only a single consensus first-round quarterback (Indiana’s Fernando Mendoza) and elite players at non-premium positions including Ohio State linebacker Sonny Styles, Ohio State safety Caleb Downs, and Oregon tight end Kenyon Sadiq should result in a free-wheeling first round according to Veach.
“I think it should be an entertaining night, and there will probably be a lot of trades and that’s what I think with a draft like this when you don’t have two or three franchise quarterbacks and a Will Anderson or a Myles Garrett, it does lend itself to open up to a lot of fun and a lot of excitement,” he said. “From a fans perspective, they should have a lot of fun next Thursday.”
