Josh Simmons Film Room
Breaking down the newest first round pick for the Kansas City Chiefs, Josh Simmons.
With the 32nd pick in the NFL Draft the Kansas City Chiefs selected Josh Simmons, offensive tackle out of Ohio State.
The pick hardly came as a surprise to most Chiefs’ fans as he had been one of - if not the - most commonly mocked player to the Chiefs at pick 31 leading up to the draft. Brett Veach was able to move back one spot in a trade and land Simmons at pick 32 with the hopes of solidifying the Chiefs’ tumultuous left tackle position for the foreseeable future.
On the surface that concept sounds incredible but typically left tackle solutions aren’t readily available at pick 32, so why was Simmons? He is rehabbing from a torn patellar tendon suffered in October. According to all readily made information, his rehab has gone well but it is a major injury which held Simmons out of most testing during the draft process. This leads to some unknowns and made it possible that a player of his caliber at left tackle was available to the Chiefs at the end of Round One.
The question is: what exactly is his caliber? Let’s dive into the Josh Simmons’ film and see what we can find!
Josh Simmons Film Room
Here on the outside we will have no true indication how Simmons is recovering from his injury so all we can do is focus on what we do know, how well he played prior to the injury occurring. That is what we’re going to do here in this film room. Here at the top is a video to my full Film Room on Josh Simmons but we’ll also touch on some of the major points below.
No prospect is a perfect player and none are guaranteed to be hits in the NFL, but sometimes you see a college player and can simply “see it” for how they’ll transition to the NFL. That’s Josh Simmons in a nutshell. Assuming he can return to 100% after his knee injury, he just has the look, athleticism, strength, and movement patterns of offensive tackles in the NFL that are at the top of the game.
Pass Protection
Simmons is an incredibly natural mover at left tackle that is able to work through various types of pass sets. He fires out of his stance to cover distance both laterally on angle sets and depth wise when working on vertical sets. This allows him to consistently beat rushers to the apex of the pocket, keep them framed in front of him, and limit their rushing options as he controls the pacing of the rep.
It’s not always the ‘sexiest’ reps for Simmons because many of them end up in a pass rusher just stalling out into his anchor or being easily escorted deep up the arc, which is great from an effective offensive line perspective. Often times athleticism and balance for offensive linemen get boiled down to how far you can move and do you stay on your feet, while the ability to be in a quality football playing body position during those activities gets ignored. Simmons doesn’t fall into that pitfall thanks to his ability to play with balance at all times.
When saying “balance” in this sense, I don’t mean simply staying upright on his feet but rather moving in a biomechanical position to deliver or absorb force at any moment - or creating tension. I talk about it in the video above but it can also be seen in these few plays, Simmons maintains fantastic body positioning from his hands all the way down to his feet in the ground. He doesn’t have to adjust his hips, feet, or shoulders in order to deliver a punch to a rusher or to absorb their strike into his body. Being able to move as effortlessly well as he does while constantly having that tension is relatively rare trait, even for the best offensive tackle prospects.