{"id":145406,"date":"2023-09-03T12:15:44","date_gmt":"2023-09-03T16:15:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/?p=145406"},"modified":"2023-09-03T12:06:46","modified_gmt":"2023-09-03T16:06:46","slug":"chiefs-chris-jones-week-1-contract","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/2023\/09\/03\/chiefs-chris-jones-week-1-contract\/","title":{"rendered":"Chiefs&#8217; Chris Jones Not Likely To Play Week 1, Two Sides &#8220;Not Close&#8221; on Contract"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In news that shouldn&#8217;t surprise too many people, defensive tackle Chris Jones is not expected to play in Week 1 of the 2023 season. The reigning First-Team All-Pro is holding out for a new contract, and that holdout is not going to end any time soon. According to NFL Network&#8217;s Ian Rapoport, Jones will not be at today&#8217;s practice and the two sides are reportedly &#8220;not close&#8221; to coming to terms on a new contract.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\"><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/Chiefs?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#Chiefs<\/a> star DT Chris Jones, who is still holding out, isn\u2019t present and won\u2019t be at today\u2019s practice \u2014 considered a Wednesday practice of game week \u2014 with the two sides not close on a deal, sources say. <\/p>\n<p>KC opens the season Thursday against the <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/Lions?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#Lions<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Ian Rapoport (@RapSheet) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/RapSheet\/status\/1698359231643054487?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">September 3, 2023<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>[cta id=4013 type=cta]<\/p>\n<h2>Chris Jones Unlikely to Play Week 1, &#8220;Not Close&#8221; On Contract Talks<\/h2>\n<p>You never want to see a star player miss a practice, but this report is especially damning for Kansas City. As reigning Super Bowl champions, the Chiefs kick off Week 1 on Thursday Night Football, and they will almost certainly be doing it without Chris Jones. Even if Jones came back today, he&#8217;d only have two days to knock off the rust and get back on the football field. Now that we know Jones won&#8217;t be practicing today, it&#8217;s hard to imagine any scenario where he&#8217;s on the field against the Detroit Lions.<\/p>\n<p>Without Jones, the Kansas City Chiefs defense could be in trouble. Even though they won the Super Bowl last year, the defense wasn&#8217;t anything to write home about. The unit finished the year ranked 15th in EPA\/play allowed, and that was with a world-wrecking force in the middle of their defensive line. Kansas City invested a first-round pick in <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/2023\/04\/06\/felix-anudike-uzomah-nfl-draft-profile-team-fits\/\" target=\"_self\">edge defender Felix Anudike-Uzomah<\/a>, but it&#8217;s unfair to expect a rookie to replace Chris Jones in Week 1 of the regular season.<\/p>\n<p>Ultimately, the Chiefs are always going to go as far as Patrick Mahomes can carry them, but losing Jones will likely turn a decent defense into a bad one. There is a very real chance that every single game will become a shootout for as long as Chris Jones isn&#8217;t on the field. The only question is, when will he return, and who will blink first?<\/p>\n<h3>The Contract<\/h3>\n<p>Based on reports across the league, we actually have a pretty good idea of what <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/2023\/09\/02\/chiefs-offer-contract-chris-jones-revealed\/\" target=\"_self\">Chris Jones wants in his revised contract<\/a>. The former second-round pick is not trying to get Aaron Donald money but instead would be happy with around $28 million per year. The Chiefs, meanwhile, are offering $24.67 million per season. This doesn&#8217;t appear to be a wide gap, but neither side is willing to budge from their current offer. The fact that Rapoport said that the two sides are &#8220;not close&#8221; implies that the player and team are done talking to each other for the foreseeable future.<\/p>\n<p>There is a chance that Kansas City&#8217;s defense falls apart without Chris Jones in Week 1 and Brett Veach gives in to Jones&#8217; demands. However, if Kansas City holds strong, we know that Jones will be back on the field before the end of the season. The defensive tackle previously tweeted out that <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/StoneColdJones\/status\/1694051219382182084?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">he will be back by Week 8<\/a>, and that he&#8217;s ok with paying the additional fines incurred from his holdout. Only time will tell if the Chiefs will actually have to wait this long, but this could be trouble for a Chiefs team playing in a remarkably competitive conference and division.<\/p>\n<p><em>Universal Responsible Gambling Disclaimer:<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>Ages 21+. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>Main Photo: Kirby Lee &#8211; USA Today Sports<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Kansas City Chiefs defensive tackle Chris Jones is not back at practice and almost certainly won&#8217;t play Week 1 as contract talks stall.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2376,"featured_media":145407,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[16,24],"tags":[7811,298,7467],"class_list":["post-145406","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-chiefs","category-lions","tag-chiefs-featured","tag-chris-jones","tag-detroit-lions-news"],"modified_by":"David Latham, Managing Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145406","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2376"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=145406"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145406\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/145407"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=145406"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=145406"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=145406"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}