KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Kansas City is on the clock as hosts for the 2023 NFL Draft and Clark Hunt wanted to make sure Chiefs fans had some excitement to look forward to next season.
Hunt, the Chiefs’ chairman and CEO, doesn’t meddle with General Manager Brett Veach’s roster construction and draft plans, but he did have some, let’s call it advice, for the the 2022 draft strategy.
“The only thing that Clark told me was, ‘You can’t trade next year’s one (first-round pick). We’ve got to have a one,’” Veach said. “Other than that, he lets me do what I want to do. He joked a few times before the draft that, ‘We’ve got to have a one next year,’ so I went in with that mindset that I couldn’t move the one.”
Savvy NFL teams don’t rely solely on first-round picks to build a winning roster, but most of the focus leading up any draft — with big boards and mock drafts — is focused on those top-32 picks.
Hunt didn’t want to rob Chiefs fans of the chance to celebrate a first-round pick during next year’s festivities.
The Las Vegas Raiders, who were the de facto hosts of the 2022 NFL Draft last week, traded their first- and second-round picks to Green Bay earlier in the offseason for wide receiver Davante Adams.
That meant Raiders fans had to wait until late on Day 2 of the draft before the hometown team finally made a pick.
“I did remind him that Vegas isn’t using a one or a two, so I had to at least throw that line out there that it’s just been done this year,” Veach said.
Still, Hunt — whose father, Lamar, founded the American Football League, which eventually merged to form the modern NFL — apparently didn’t want a repeat, not with Kansas City set to showcase its new airport and the city to the world next April.
“We’re certainly extremely excited about the draft here next year,” Veach said. “It was Clark’s idea, he mentioned that maybe we should look into getting a room over at Union Station and making that our make-shift draft room, so we can be there and experience what we believe is going to be a tremendous event.”
