A Chiefs-Saints trade to answer Kansas City’s biggest lingering question

For a Kansas City Chiefs team that entered the offseason coming off of two-straight Super Bowl victories, the club had some pressing needs to continue their run into the 2025 season -- or at least to make Patrick Mahomes' job easier. But as we're in a post-draft world, they've largely done that as they drafted Xavier Worthy (though the Rashee Rice situation complicates receiver further), drafted Kingsley Suamataia to play tackle, paid Chris Jones, and trade L'Jarius Sneed.

That last part, however, still looms over the Chiefs a bit. They didn't draft a cornerback until Kamal Haden in the sixth round, which seems to indicate that 2023 breakout Trent McDuffie will be flanked by the likes of Joshua Williams and Jaylen Watson at cornerback. Of course, one trade could change that.

And New Orleans Saints cornerback Marshon Lattimore is a prime candidate to be traded. More pointedly, he's also a trade candidate the Chiefs should be highly intrigued by.

Though the Saints front office has been hot-and-cold this offseason about trading Lattimore, he recently liked an Instagram post suggesting a trade for him to the Houston Texans. As a rising AFC contender, though, Houston represents a threat to Kansas City and the Chiefs could both thwart their efforts while helping their own cause by pursuing a trade for the Saints cornerback.

What would that trade look like and what would it mean for each club, though? Let's take a look at our trade proposal to get Marshon Lattimore on the Chiefs.

Chiefs-Saints trade package that lands Marshon Lattimore in Kansas City

We've seen a third-round pick thrown around as a package that could potentially pry Lattimore from the Saints. However, with the right structure, the Chiefs could A. force New Orleans' hand and B. potentially avoid taking on his entire salary. Here's what that package would look like:

Ironically, the Chiefs are able to use the extra third-round pick acquired via the Sneed trade with the Titans earlier this offseason to send to the Saints as a more valuable Day 2 pick given the expectation that Tennessee will be noticeably worse than Kansas City this season. But then they throw in a 2026 fifth-rounder to sweeten the pot in order to get this deal done.

The trade would absolutely behoove both clubs as a post-June 1 move. That timing would allow the Saints to spread out the dead cap hits between 2024 and 2025 in a way that creates a hair less than $4 million in space this year but over $10 million for next season. For a team that had to clear $60 million at one point this offseason, that could be huge.

More pressingly for the Chiefs, the structure of Lattimore's contract with the way the Saints restructured it opens up a ton of doors and leaves them with a ton of flexibility. If they were to exercise the option on the cornerback's deal, they would only incur a cap hit slightly below $4 million for the 2024 season and would have immense flexibility to get out of the deal after this year.

The real question with this trade would be if the Chiefs simply want to be this aggressive. Brett Veach and Steve Spagnuolo alike have done a phenomenal job develop9ng later-round defensive backs and one could argue they might want to continue that course of action looking at guys like a Joshua Williams, who is currently the alternative on the outside if they don't make another free-agent signing or trade.

I would argue that a cheap one-year rental of Lattimore could be more valuable for a team eyeing a three-peat of Super Bowl titles. So if they want to make this trade, the cost in every facet seems worth it if they make the call -- especially with other AFC contenders potentially likely to make a similar offer.