The Kansas City Chiefs nearly had a full house on Sunday, with only four players absent from their first training camp practice.
One of those players, veteran DT Chris Jones, has not yet reported for training camp as he seeks a long-term contract extension. The First-Team All-Pro defensive tackle is in the final year of his 2020 contract extension with Kansas City. After a lucrative offseason for the defensive tackle position group around the NFL, Jones is looking to cash in on a career year in 2022.
Speaking to reporters after Sunday’s practice, Chiefs HC Andy Reid provided an update on the situation with Jones moving forward.
“As far as Chris (Jones) goes, we’ll just see how things go here down the road,” Reid said. “There have been communications, we’ll see where it goes from here. We’ll take it. If you’re not here, we just keep moving and that’s how we roll. We don’t worry a lot about all that. We let it take care of itself.”
Reid has been quite consistent in worrying about coaching the players who are in attendance at training camp and not worrying about those who aren’t yet on the practice field. He’s taken the same approach throughout his tenure in Kansas City.
As per tradition at the first training camp practice, Chiefs CEO and Chairman Clark Hunt took some time to address the media. After being questioned about Jones’ absence, Hunt emphasized that contract negotiations are strictly on Brett Veach and his staff. He signs the checks, but he’s not directly involved in those conversations.
“I leave that to Brett Veach & his staff,” Hunt said. “I’m not involved in that.”
Hunt also wouldn’t speculate on when or if Jones might report to training camp, but he did say the team would welcome him with open arms at any time.
“We love Chris (Jones) and when he decides to report, we’ll welcome him,” Hunt continued. “I don’t want to get into speculating on when that’ll happen or if that’ll happen.”
There seems to be optimism that Jones will have a new deal. He could report to training camp prior to that deal happening if only to stop the fines. For each practice session missed, Jones will receive a $50K fine as mandated by the NFL and NFLPA’s most recent Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA). He’ll be fined $950K total should he miss all of the team’s 2023 training camp practice sessions.
