Don't Expect Much From Chiefs At NFL Supplemental Draft

NFL fans finally have a ray of light amidst the clamor of other sports this week. With baseball All-Star festivities, the continued celebration of Spain's World Cup victory, the LeBron fallout and other free agency news in the NBA and so on, it's the time of year where the NFL press corps finally take their vacations and the league seems to be hibernating in its multi-billion dollar cave somewhere. But soon enough, the beast will stir.

That's because this Thursday, July 15, the annual supplemental draft will take place. A quick synopsis: the SD doesn't operate the same way the regular NFL Draft does, instead having teams submit closed or secret bids on what round they would take that player in if it was a regular draft. The team then loses that draft pick in the next year's draft. Sounds easy enough and it really is, since players are taken so rarely. Only 38 players have been taken in the 33-year history of the draft with Redskins defensive end Jeremy Jarmon being the only player selected in last year's affair.

The types of players who fall through the cracks are those ineligible for the regular draft, but who become open for the SD because of their college eligibility issues. Other players have had off-the-field problems or legal woes that kept them off the NCAA display case and left them waiting for another way into an NFL camp. Either way, it's usually an eyebrow-raising scenario that almost certainly keeps ultra-conservative GMs from even scouting such players.

Over at Arrowhead Pride, you can find many links to the Chiefs possible interests in the draft, but chances are that the Chiefs won't really be that active. While we might hear about the Chiefs interest in these players, there's something special about the competition that forms in the weeks before the NFL Draft that forces players to raise their game. Here, it's being a big fish in a small pond and Scott Pioli values his draft picks enough to wait unless he's absolutely bowled over by someone. Then again, it's something to talk about for the NFL fan, so perhaps it's worth guessing about.