Why this Chiefs rookie — not their first-round pick — is most crucial to their plans

The Chiefs are back playing football again — the Super Bowl provides the prize of a condensed offseason — but as it does every year, training camp has opened with something resembling a senior skip day.

Or a few skip days.

It’s rookies and quarterbacks only for the initial week, along with those who are rehabbing injuries. The veterans join practices Sunday.

But the biggest storyline of training camp is already here. Already on the field at Missouri Western in St. Joseph.

A rookie.

Really, you can’t miss him.

Kingsley Suamataia, all 325 pounds of him, will be locked into a battle to start at left tackle after the Chiefs used their second-round draft pick to select him out of BYU in the spring. Wanya Morris, and maybe a couple of others, will provide competition, but let’s acknowledge the obvious: Although Suamataia won’t be handed the job, the Chiefs sure would prefer he win it.

How can that be the biggest storyline on a team that includes Patrick Mahomes, Travis Kelce and Chris Jones?

Well, it’s a significant unknown for an organization that has built a dynasty on avoiding uncertainty. The Chiefs have made a habit of finding answers before the questions arise.

Maybe they have one in Suamataia. But for now, they’ve got a pretty big question at a pretty big position, and it’s still outstanding with training camp here: Who protects the blind side of Patrick Mahomes?

The Chiefs have enjoyed immediate rookie impacts in recent seasons — Rashee Rice last year, Trent McDuffie and George Karlaftis the year before, Nick Bolton, Creed Humphrey and Trey Smith another year earlier. You get the idea. They play rookies. Some of them become key contributors quickly.

But it’s been a minute since they’ve so obviously needed a rookie to develop quickly. And, again, this conversation is about one of football’s most premium positions, one that often asks its player to beat the best the NFL has to offer one-on-one, a bit different than a conversation about, say, a rookie wide receiver.

If it is the rookie, the history encapsulates its difficulty. Get this: All of two rookies have started at least half their team’s regular season games at left tackle and then won the Super Bowl that same season, searching through the historical data available on Stathead — Matt Light started 12 for the Patriots in 2001, and John Michels started nine for Green Bay in 1996.

That’s it. And only two more have even appeared in the Super Bowl under that same criteria — starting at least half their team’s games during the regular season. None of the four who advanced to the Super Bowl started more than 12 in the regular season at left tackle. (A handful have started at right tackle, and several along the interior.)

In other words, if Suamataia breaks this Chiefs training camp as the starting left tackle — and the Chiefs will give him every opportunity to do just that — a three-peat would not only produce never-seen-it NFL history for a team but also barely-seen-it history for a particular rookie.

Kind of remarkable, isn’t it? That’s one way to look at it.

Here’s another: Kind of difficult, isn’t it?

Look, team success certainly isn’t the only measure of a player (nor even the best measure of a player), but I find it quite intriguing that past champions just simply haven’t relied on rookie left tackles. As for individual accolades, I’ll note that, yes, there have occasionally been rookie Pro Bowlers at the position — six of them since 1970, though all but one was drafted in the initial 13 picks.

Most take time. Heck, most take time at any position, but there’s no easing into left tackle. That’s really the point. No matter his talent, and no matter how quickly he picks things up, Suamataia will see some things from opposing defenses and opposing blitz packages that he’s yet to see and therefore make some mistakes he doesn’t even yet know are possible. That’s the purpose of training camp for every rookie in every city, to expedite that process. The Chiefs believe he’s a quick learner. They know he’ll have to be.

This position, left tackle, just happens to find himself frequently all by his lonesome. And the winner of this position, the Chiefs left tackle, will line up against Maxx Crosby and a resurgent Khalil Mack twice and Myles Garrett, Nick Bosa, T.J. Watt and Trey Hendrickson once each.

There’s a reason it’s considered a premium positions by all analytics. Certainly no one in Kansas City needs to be reminded of a left tackle’s importance.

A 2024 wrinkle, though: The Chiefs want to make some changes to their offense this season, and they just so happen to be changes that hinge on protection. They want to throw the deep ball again — or at least throw it more effectively — and they revamped the wide receiver room with that goal in mind.

You know, if they have time.

You can’t forget Mahomes walking to the sideline of his first Super Bowl and asking then-offensive coordinator Eric Bieniemy a seven-word question that would become Kansas City-famous.

Do we have time to run Wasp?

It was a kind teammate’s way of asking: Can my offensive line block long enough?

That part of the equation doesn’t leave, even as the five men protecting him change.

It’s not as though the Chiefs are replacing an All-Pro left tackle last season. Donovan Smith had an up-and-down season in 2023, particularly as a run blocker. There’s a reason he’s still a free agent as 32 teams head to camp.

Suamataia could represent an improvement in the end. He has the physical tools — they like his combination of strength and quick movements. Whether that comes together immediately or takes some time?

That returns us to the spot the Chiefs have actively avoided over the last half-decade:

The unknown.