Kansas City Chiefs dodge potential rookie contract complication right before OTAs
The Kansas City Chiefs continue to take care of some important business ahead of offseason workouts, this time nipping a potential problem in the bud. According to the team's transaction page, the Chiefs have signed second-round draft pick Kingsley Suamataia to his four-year rookie contract. The team reports that Suamataia signed his rookie deal on Monday, […]
The Kansas City Chiefs continue to take care of some important business ahead of offseason workouts, this time nipping a potential problem in the bud.
According to the team's transaction page, the Chiefs have signed second-round draft pick Kingsley Suamataia to his four-year rookie contract. The team reports that Suamataia signed his rookie deal on Monday, May 20. However, the deal was not made official on the personnel notice, which suggests they simply didn't get that deal done before the deadline to submit it to the league office. Expect it to be made official on Tuesday afternoon's personnel notice.
Suamatia becomes the sixth of seven 2024 NFL draft picks to sign his contract with the team. The only rookie who hasn't put pen to paper is first-round draft pick Xavier Worthy. It's reasonable to expect all draft picks could be under contract before the team's mandatory minicamp in mid-June.
Chiefs avoid a potential contract complication with second-round pick
Nowadays, the rookie wage scale really prevents rookie-related contract holdouts from happening. Most contracts include a signing bonus and guaranteed money strictly based on draft slots. There are very few aspects of rookie contracts that are truly negotiable, but guaranteed money, offset language and more make second- and third-round draft picks some of the tougher deals to agree upon. This typically means they take longer to get done as opposed to anything resembling a "holdout."
One reason this particular deal might not have been as complicated to negotiate is that they already had a model for the deal when Baltimore Ravens OT Roger Rosengarten agreed to his four-year rookie contract. Rosengarten was taken with pick No. 62 while Suamataia was taken with pick No. 63. Expect that Suamataia's contract will look much like Rosengarten's deal with the Ravens. Rosengarten signed a four-year deal worth over $6.4 million, including a $1.5 million signing bonus, and over $3.3 million in total guaranteed money.
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