Over the past five seasons, the Kansas City Chiefs have been trying to build out their defensive line room around Chris Jones. They’ve spent early capital on George Karlaftis, Felix Anudike-Uzomah, Omar Norman-Lott, and Ashton Gillotte, but haven’t quite hit the homerun they’ve been looking for. Karlaftis is a nice second fiddle, but the Chiefs have still been chasing for better.
Enter Peter Woods, the 29th overall pick in the 2026 NFL Draft by the Kansas City Chiefs. Woods began his collegiate career on a tear with the Clemson Tigers, immediately becoming an impact player. He continued that momentum into his sophomore year, in which they used him up and down the defensive line. He was projected as a potential top-five — even some draft analysts' top player — pick coming into the 2025 college season, but the production simply wasn’t there.
Woods stacked on an uneven draft process with smaller measurements (6’3”, 298lbs) than expected and a lack of full testing data, thanks to a reported hamstring injury. His draft stock became volatile heading into the 2026 NFL Draft to the point that he wasn’t a Day 1 lock. When the Chiefs got on the clock at pick 29, they had defensive line options like Woods’ teammate TJ Parker or Auburn’s Keldric Faulk, but the Chiefs, in an attempt to add talent to their defensive line room, went with Peter Woods. Let’s take a dive into the tape and see what the Chiefs may see in his game.
Peter Woods Five Play Film Room
1) Dynamic Rush Potential
Peter Woods calling card as a first-round defensive tackle is going to be his pass-rush potential. More than just his upside as a rusher, it’s his upside as a dynamic rusher with the combination of athleticism, power, and technique that allows him to win quickly on the line of scrimmage. He didn’t put up the production metrics many defensive tackles drafted that early do in his collegiate career, but it wasn’t for a lack of dominant reps that resulted in quick wins like the first play above.
That club-arm over move that Woods won with was a play from his true freshman season at just 18 years old and shows everything someone needs to see to understand the ceiling. It starts with a quick reaction time off the ball, followed by an explosive first step that allows him to close space on the offensive lineman instantly. He quickly transitioned from the raw explosion out of his stance to setting up his rush move by attacking the outside shoulder and hip of the blocker. As he steps outside of the blocker’s frame, the offensive lineman has to lean onto his outside leg as well as forward to try and stall out Woods rush. Woods then counters with a powerful inside club that removes the blocker’s hand while simultaneously planting his outside leg and making an explosive lateral cut back to the inside. At this point, Woods has beaten the blocker’s hands, but he still has to get around the blocker.
That’s when Woods brings his own outside arm over the top with an arm-over move to fully clear the hands and frame of the offensive lineman. This is impressive enough, but at 18 years old, Woods knew there was more needed, or he would be washed out of the rush. He drives his outside foot upfield while rotating his outside shoulder forward or towards the middle of the field. This pulls his hips beyond the offensive lineman’s and gives the blocker less surface area to make contact with on Woods’ back, but again, that is not all. Woods is still getting contacted laterally by the lineman, and in a small space, he can’t afford to simply work around him with a wide angle. Instead, he absorbs that contact and transfers it into a powerful collision with the center and uses that impact to continue propelling himself forward in the pocket.
This seems like a ton to take away from a single play, but that’s what makes it so impressive, especially as an 18-year-old. Woods puts himself in a great position with his explosion off the snap, sets the blocker up with his footwork and entry, uses his lateral explosion and hand technique to beat the blocker’s hands, shows fantastic body control to cross-face and get into a new gap, and finishes the rush off, showing the power to fight through contact and the understanding of how to navigate traffic. Each of these traits translates to the NFL, but combine them all, and you have the potential for something great.
