Wanya Morris, Kingsley Suamataia and What’s Next for the Chiefs’ Left Tackle Position

When looking to assign blame for Sunday’s debacle, several members of the Kansas City Chiefs deserve criticism. Patrick Mahomes missed a pair of should-have-been touchdowns, the Chiefs’ defense was good but not great, Trent McDuffie had perhaps his worst game as a pro, and, with a poor kickoff, Harrison Butker gave the Denver Broncos the ball at their own 40-yard line to begin their final drive of the game. Those factors, along with a difficult-to-disastrous day from the Chiefs’ offensive line contributed to the Chiefs suffering their first loss of the— Oh neat, they won!

Yes, the Chiefs remain undefeated after a last-second blocked field goal, which should certainly give Chiefs fans a more enjoyable week while providing a soothing silver lining for what was largely a cloudy day for the reigning back-to-back champions. However, of all the Chiefs’ issues, one appears to be a more apparent cause for concern than the rest.

As the season rolls on, I’m not big-picture worried about Mahomes, McDuffie or Butker’s bad plays. I’m also not particularly concerned about KC’s D-line and interior O-line getting pushed around for parts of the day. Their résumés speak for themselves. The concerns about the left tackle position, however, may have some legitimacy.

The Chiefs entered training camp with a competition for the starting left tackle job. Rookie second-round pick Kingsley Suamataia would battle with second-year third-round pick Wanya Morris. While Morris battled injuries in camp and the preseason, Suamataia held the job and started KC’s first two games at left tackle. Late in Week 2’s game against the Cincinatti Bengals, Suamataia was pulled in favor of Morris, who has retained the starting job since. Morris left the Broncos game early in the second quarter due to a knee injury before returning in the fourth quarter. Suamataia struggled mightily in Morris’s stead. Where does that leave KC? It depends on who you ask.

The best news for the Chiefs is that Morris returned to the game. The worst news is that Suamataia, just a few months after projecting as the high-upside future of the position, looked nearly unplayable at times on Sunday. While his future could still be promising, we’re likely clear of any more conversations about who the starter should be for the rest of the 2024-25 season. Beyond Suamataia, some Chiefs fans began looking to remaining free agent options for a potential bolstering of the position. One strikes me as plausible while the other remains as unconvincing as it was when I wrote about his connection to the Chiefs in June.

Let’s start with the player I still don’t see a role for: former Green Bay Packers left tackle David Bakhtiari. The former All-Pro tackle certainly sounds like a worthwhile addition until you remember the circumstances that led to him remaining unemployed into mid-November.

Bakhtiari, 33, hasn’t played a 16-game season since 2019 and played just 13 total games from the 2021–23 seasons. One game in ’21, 11 in 22, one in ’23. He hasn’t played in a football game since September 10, 2023. His ever-present injury woes undercut his previous upside. Even for a team that now relies so heavily on veteran in-season additions like Kareem Hunt and DeAndre Hopkins, Bakhtiari wouldn’t supply the thing the Chiefs need the most: reliability.

The other much-discussed candidate for the job is a familiar face: Donovan Smith. Smith started 12 regular-season games for KC last season in addition to all four playoff games as the team marched to the Super Bowl. At 31 years old, Smith also remains a free agent as his Super Bowl-winning play last year apparently wasn’t enough to drum up much of a market for the veteran.

Knowing the offense, Smith would have less of a learning curve in a return to KC and could provide a familiarity for Mahomes if the Chiefs were to make a change at left tackle. Still, Morris would likely start with the inside track to retain the starting job. If Smith would return to Kansas City in a backup role, at least while he returns to practice and while Morris gets a few more games to show stability, the reunion would make sense. It would be a damning move for Suamataia, but it can’t do more to harm his confidence than his own poor performance has offered.

Ultimately, I don’t believe that Morris will be the reason the Chiefs don’t complete a three-peat. If you could guarantee Morris’s health, I’d argue for standing pat and rolling with the unit they have. Since that’s not an option, I can’t help but think about what could happen if Morris misses time in a playoff game, forcing Suamataia back into action. (The same concerns could apply to right tackle Jawaan Taylor, as Suamataia is regularly the Chiefs’ only active backup tackle on game days, with developmental tackle Ethan Driskell effectively redshirting as a healthy scratch this season.) Still just a rookie with a little more than two games worth of action, Suamataia’s status as the weakest link in the offense could be exploitable in must-win games.

The Chiefs will have to decide if it’s time to formally end the Suamataia experience for this year and to bolster the group with the return of Smith, or if they’ve seen enough from the rookie on the practice field and in meeting rooms to believe that he’ll continue growing as the year progresses. After Sunday’s struggles, there’s no reason to assume that the team would be excited about seeing Suamataia back at left tackle this season.

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