Chiefs News: Justin Reid eager to see what Chiefs’ young DBs will do

Lights-out secondary play in 2024 is a major reason the Kansas City Chiefs will enter the season as defending Super Bowl champions for the second time in as many years.

Following Friday’s organized team activity (OTA) session, safety Justin Reid weighed in on what he has seen from the team’s defensive backs this offseason. Reid is exceptionally high on fellow safety Jaden Hicks, selected by Kansas City in the fourth round of April’s NFL Draft out of Washington State.

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“I love Hicks,” the veteran declared. “[He’s a] physical kid. [He’s] smart, athletic, and willing to learn. Very humble in the sense that he’s willing to take coaching. I stay after practice with him all the time. We work on little things here and there, and he’s soaking everything up. He’s going to be a player for us this year. He’s going to help us.”

Kansas City’s defensive backs leader is also impressed with what he has seen from third-year cornerback Nazeeh Johnson — who missed the 2023 season while recovering from an ACL tear suffered in training camp.

“Nazeeh’s progress last year — he was on track to start,” Reid recalled. “He was really developing so well. Just a consistent, smart player. Knows the calls, willing tackler. Then he had that unfortunate injury, and he’s been shaking back.

“He was able to get some more reps with the ones again today. He’s healing remarkably and really moving around well. He’ll continue to build his confidence back up, and he’ll be another good player and another weapon for us.”

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The Chiefs will need weapons in the secondary after trading starting cornerback L’Jarius Sneed to the Tennessee Titans earlier this offseason. Reid knows there will not be a one-for-one replacement for one of football’s best coverage options, but he looks forward to seeing what some of the next options on the depth chart bring in their own ways.

“You don’t replace a guy like LJ,” he acknowledged. “LJ is special. He was unique. He was physical. We all loved him here. But there is opportunity for the next man to create his own stamp. You don’t look for a carbon copy. You don’t look for another LJ.

“There’s opportunity on the field right now for Joshua Williams. For Nazeeh Johnson. For Jaylen Watson. For some of the rookies that we’ve brought in. There are opportunities there for those guys to step up and create a name for themselves. So, we just continue to coach them up and allow them to have the opportunity to do that.”

Reid is not above being coached up to improve his craft, even as he heads into his seventh season. The now-two-time Super Bowl champion described his training plan for the remainder of the offseason following next week’s mandatory minicamp.

“I have a consistent routine,” he explained. “There’s a group of [defensive backs] that I train with every year — about 14 of us — we usually go to Phoenix, and we train there. We’ll go there about two weeks before training camp.

“The first two weeks, I’ll most likely be here just continuing to work with our strength staff — because they do an excellent job keeping guys in shape and they’ll get you prepared for the grind that training camp at St. Joe always is. The next two weeks is more technical stuff that I go train with the DBs that I train with every year with [former Pro Bowl safety] Ryan Clark leading us.”