The Kansas City Chiefs enter the offseason in salary cap hell, with the team currently $55 million over the cap for 2026 according to StickToTheModel. That's the worst situation in the league by a wide margin, with the second-worst situation being the Minnesota Vikings at $40 million over.
That's a lot of money. For example, it would take me approximately 785 years to earn $55 million at my current salary. Luckily for the Chiefs, though, it won't take them nearly that long to find that money, as NFL teams have plenty of mechanisms to create cap space. Let's see if we can get the Chiefs to a reasonable number before the NFL Draft.
Cutting players to create room
Let's play around with StickToTheModel and see what we can come up with to take the Chiefs off this financial cliff.
The first big move here is an obvious one: cutting right tackle Jawaan Taylor. While there's upside with Taylor, his tendency to commit penalties is an issue for the Chiefs, as it disrupts the flow of the offense and forces the team into more "and long" situations. Taylor alone isn't the cause for the team's issues in 2025, but he certainly didn't help, and I imagine that plenty of Chiefs fans are ready to move on from him. I know all the ones I talk to here in Iowa are.
Taylor is due $26.9 million against the cap in 2026. By cutting him, the Chiefs would save $19.5 million, moving them to approximately $35.4 million over the cap. Still work to be done, but that's a nice start.
The team can save another $8.8 million by cutting Mike Danna. He's been a solid piece for this defense since 2020, but after a career-low one sack in 2025, you probably feel alright about moving on, especially with such a cap crunch. Take Danna away and the Chiefs are only $26.7 million over the cap.
Finally, you can save another $5.8 million by releasing linebacker Drue Tranquill. That one stings a bit more than the other two because he's been a key piece of this defense, but sacrifices have to be made sometimes. In this case, that means moving on from a player who just tied his career high in tackles for loss.
Cut Candidate | Savings If Cut |
|---|---|
Jawaan Taylor | $19.5 million |
Mike Danna | $8.8 million |
Drue Tranquill | $5.8 million |
So, we cut all three of these players, which puts the Chiefs at $20.9 million over the cap. That's, uhh, still bad, isn't it? And there aren't really many more players you can cut to create space. Jaylon Moore would save you $7.8 million, but you'd still be paying $11 million in dead money for him, which kind of defeats the purpose. Plus, you may need Moore with Taylor gone, so...what now?
Restructuring contracts
It's time to push some cans down the road. And specifically, it's time to push the Patrick Mahomes can down the road.
Mahomes has a $77.2 million cap hit in 2026, a number that basically explains all of the cap issues. Simply put, Kansas City can't go into 2026 with Mahomes taking up $77.2 million of cap space, so it's time to restructure his deal.
There are plenty of ways to do a restructure, but for simplicity's sake, we're going with what StickToTheModel says is the standard restructure, spreading the cap hit over the remaining five years of Mahomes' deal and lowering the 2026 hit from $77.2 million down to $41.9 million. This saves $35.3 million on the current cap and brings you into the green, with $14.4 million in 2026 cap space.
So, you're good, right?
Yeah...not really. That's not even going to be enough to sign all your draft picks, much less re-sign players or bring in free agents. So, let's go ahead and restructure the other big one on the books: Chris Jones.
The Jones number isn't as dramatic as the Mahomes number, but a standard restructure would net you $13.4 million more in cap space, which certainly helps.
Player | Potential Savings with Restructure |
|---|---|
Patrick Mahomes | $35.3 million |
Chris Jones | $13.4 million |
With the Jones restructure done, we're at $27.8 million in space. That's still not ideal, but it helps make things workable this offseason, which is better than it might otherwise have been.
Smaller moves to create more space
We've created something out of nothing. At this point, it becomes a question of what small moves can be made to create more flexibility if needed.
Potential Cut Candidate | Savings If Cut |
|---|---|
Chamarri Conner | $3.8 million |
Wanya Morris | $1.7 million |
Zacch Pickens | $1.1 million |
Matt Waletzko | $1.1 million |
C.J. Hanson | $1.1 million |
These moves don't feel nearly as pressing, but they're there if the Chiefs need more wiggle room, which they might if they plan to bring tight end Travis Kelce back, assuming Kelce opts not to retire.
If we cut all five, the Chiefs are at $36.1 million. A one-year deal for Kelce probably costs about $10 million unless he's willing to take a discount, leaving you back around $22 million after also accounting for RFA tenders.
It's still not perfect. The Chiefs having to push Mahomes and Jones' deals down the road is particularly bad because it creates even messier situations down the line. However, that's the price of being a competitive football team, right?