After getting shut out of choosing a large receiver within the first spherical of the 2023 NFL Draft, the Kansas Metropolis Chiefs have been intentional on Thursday evening, buying and selling with the Buffalo Payments to maneuver up and seize their man.
That was Texas extensive receiver Xavier Worthy, whom the Chiefs chosen with the twenty eighth total choose. The very first thing that stands out in regards to the 5-foot-11, 165-pounder is his blazing pace.
Along with his 4.21 40-yard sprint on the Scouting Mix, Worthy set the NFL report for the quickest time ever. However his downfield potential isn’t the one factor that caught Kansas Metropolis’s eye.
Greater than only a speedster
“[He’s a] good route runner,” mentioned head coach Andy Reid of Worthy after the Chiefs made the choice. “He’s received good peak; he’s simply not very heavy. However I feel you’ll see this toughness that he’s received, which jumped out at me. Whenever you speak to their coach — [Texas] coach [Steve] Sarkisian and I are shut. He stored speaking about how good he was. He’s received nice soccer instincts, and he’s an incredible employee. On this offense, you bought to have the ability to try this and have these traits.”
Like Reid, Worthy needed to make it clear instantly that he presents extra than simply vertical pace.
“I really feel like down the sector is clearly a given, however I really feel like intermediate and the precise route working, the route tree, I really feel like I can run all of it,” mentioned Worthy on his preliminary Zoom with the Kansas Metropolis media. “I really feel like I’m efficient from all of it — bubble screens, reverses. Wherever a ball can contact my arms, I really feel like I could make a play.”
In fact, the warp pace ought to assist. When the Chiefs traded extensive receiver Tyreek Hill within the offseason following the 2021 season, they misplaced a component of their offense that grew to become extremely troublesome to copy.
Kansas Metropolis nonetheless managed to win back-to-back Tremendous Bowls in 2022 and 2023, but it surely took the offense to win extra within the intermediate areas of the sector — and with the protection taking part in a better function. The addition of Hollywood Brown through free company (and now Worthy) ought to allow the Chiefs and quarterback Patrick Mahomes to get again to their roots, with opposing defenses having to respect the specter of a downfield cross.
Normal supervisor Brett Veach feels the duo of Brown and Worthy ought to open issues up for your complete offense.
“Having Xavier and Hollywood, I feel, will make life simpler for Travis [Kelce] and Rashee [Rice],” mentioned Veach. “I feel, because the season goes on right here, we’ll have an offense that may assault in a number of other ways and all the time preserve defenses guessing.”
“Each these two (Brown and Worthy) can run effectively,” added Reid. “I feel each like to play the sport and are good soccer gamers. I feel that can assist us. It doesn’t harm to have down-the-field pace. We’ve functioned with out the nice pace down the sector and achieved effectively. However, when you have a possibility to get any person that you simply suppose is an efficient participant — simply not a pace man, however an excellent soccer participant — I feel you most likely must benefit from that.”
The team-building a part of drafting Worthy is vital, too. As a result of he was chosen within the first spherical, Worthy stays below workforce management for the following 5 seasons.
“If there’s an opportunity Hollywood can are available in right here and produce, we’d love to increase him, however the actuality of it’s, he’s solely on a one-year deal, too,” acknowledged Veach. “There’s a premium on this league on pace and playmaking potential — and [Worthy] has that — so I feel the imaginative and prescient is we’ve him for 5 years now, and that’s a giant deal for us as we attempt to preserve this factor collectively and add items.
“These playmakers are exhausting to return by, they usually’re costly within the offseason. For this yr, having him and Hollywood and Travis and Rashee, I feel goes to be actually thrilling. However we additionally know there’s the extra issue that you’ve Xavier below contract for 5 years. And in order that’s a motivating issue, simply the size of those contracts.”
Kansas Metropolis’s new returner
Worthy also needs to profit the Chiefs on particular groups. In 2023, the Soccer Writers Affiliation of America and The Sporting Information named him a second-team All-American as a punt returner.
With final yr’s high returner choices, Richie James and Mecole Hardman, now not with the membership, Worthy might be penciled in at that place. And he appears able to tackle that function.
“I’m a small man, small participant, so I type of pleasure myself on simply being a difference-maker,” defined Worthy, “any person that’s going to make a play, whether or not that’s being robust, making a giant play simply on blocking, receiving the ball on particular groups. Something. I simply pleasure myself with coronary heart, and I really feel like that’s what motivates me and makes me completely different.”
Kansas Metropolis received to know Worthy on the mix, and Reid instantly took a liking to him.
“I like his make-up,” declared Reid. “I like the truth that he may go all day — and that he loves soccer. You guys type of know the way we’re wired right here. Brett makes that an actual attribute that he likes. Likewise, as coaches, we love that… You might inform. He’s passionate in regards to the sport. I feel you may see this while you meet him. And he likes to play. And he’s good at it.”
Veach mentioned that the scout on Worthy described him as coachable and tough-minded.
“You might have a dynamic playmaker with top-end vertical pace,” the final supervisor mentioned. “Good, and you’ll transfer him round, do various things with him. I feel it was, from the place we began, each step of the way in which, it simply type of validated the issues we thought all alongside.”
A sneaking suspicion
Someway, by all of it, Worthy says he all the time knew he’d be a Chief.
“I’ve been calling it,” he mentioned. “I’ve been saying it for the reason that starting of the yr. ‘I’m going to the Chiefs.’ All people thought the NFL was by no means going to let the Chiefs get to me. However I’m right here. I’m excited, man, simply to have the ability to play with Pat. Seeing the success that Tyreek Hill had on this offense, I really feel like it will likely be wonderful.”
Worthy received’t be Hill, precisely. And he received’t have to be. Reid truly likens him extra to a different one among his former gamers: DeSean Jackson.
However you already know what? That’s OK. If Thursday is the primary evening of a 15-year NFL profession, he’ll most likely take it… particularly as he considers his quarterback.
“All people’s dream is to play with Patrick Mahomes, most likely one of many best quarterbacks of all time. Simply to have the ability to play for him, all people talks about it. I’ve been saying it for some time.
“‘I’m going to be a Chief.’
He was proper.
