Steve Spagnuolo confesses that he misses a star who left the Chiefs ‘every day’

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As much as the Kansas City Chiefs’ offense in 2023 wasn’t all it was cracked up to be – in fact, it was well below what everyone was imagining – the defensive game stood out and showed its dominance at many points during the season.

Until the playoffs, the offense didn’t seem to have woken up and it was the defenders who carried all the weight.

Chris Jones, L’Jarius Sneed, Trent McDuffie, Justin Reid and George Karlaftis were some of the key names in last year’s defence.

Incidentally, in 2023 KC fielded the youngest defense in the NFL – according to NFL Research, the average age was 25 years and 279 days.

The last time the league had the youngest defense to reach a Super Bowl was in 2009, with the Indianapolis Colts.

Steve Spagnuolo, the brilliant mind behind Chiefs’ defense

Of course, Kansas City’s defensive success is not only down to the players, but also to the entire coaching staff that prepares them.

Steve Spagnuolo, together with Andy Reid, are doing an excellent job.

The two of them are considered by many in the squad to be a ‘father figure’ to the younger players because of all the care they give them when they’re introduced to the system.

Spags, the defensive coordinator, manages to get the most out of his players and maximise their qualities on the field.

Last season, the Chiefs gave up the fewest points per game in the regular season (17.3) and playoffs (13.7) since hiring the DC in 2019.

Filling in for L’Jarius Sneed

Kansas City, this offseason, had to make choices, however much they hurt.

In order to keep their big stars on the team, the organisation decided to make a trade involving L’Jarius Sneed. He will now play for the Tennessee Titans. In exchange, KC received a third-round pick in the 2025 Draft, as well as a position switch in the seventh round of 2024.

Sneed received the franchise tag from the Chiefs, which would have put him on a one-year, US$19.8 million contract. However, his wish was for a longer deal.

The cornerback’s franchise tag was ‘non-exclusive’, meaning that Sneed was free to negotiate with other teams.

That’s why a trade to the Chiefs made sense, so as not to lose the defender for free eventually. Not to mention the amount it freed up on the franchise’s salary cap.

The consistency of the defense will certainly be maintained, but there are things that only Sneed could do.

Spagnuolo’s 2024 defense challenge

The departure of the star of the defending champions’ secondary naturally opens up more space for McDuffie to become a starter.

Last Monday at training camp, Spags spoke to the media about this possibility.

“We’ll see how that goes. I mean, almost every game, we had LJ (L’Jarius Sneed) travel with the “top receiver,” whether we do that or not with Trent (McDuffie), it’ll just be a game-by-game plan. We’ll see who the other corner is and who the nickel is.” said Spagnuolo.

The DC confessed that LJ is sorely missed.

“There’s still a lot of unknowns right now. We got some work to do back there. We certainly miss LJ; I miss him every day.”

It seems that the scenarios are open to whoever is going to fulfil the role he played in the secondary. But the coach makes it clear that it may be necessary to use a different approach.

“Some of the schemes might change. We’ll see somebody going to step up and serve that particular role. If we don’t, we go in another direction and find another way to do it,” noted. “In the years we’ve been here, we always, every game, travel a corner. We did it a little bit when Charvarius Ward was here; we did with him, but it’ll be a game-by-game thing.”