Jeff Hanisch-USA TODAY Sports
On Saturday Braden Wilson was riding high, having been drafted by his hometown Kansas City Chiefs and looking at a team without a true fullback in 2012 and a new head coach that demands one on the roster. As of this Wednesday, it’s time to start hitting the weight room because the path to making the 53-man roster got a lot more difficult with the addition of Cardinals FB Anthony Sherman.
Wilson was taken in the sixth round of the NFL draft after cutting his teeth at K-State while blocking for Collin Klein and John Hubert (both players accumulated almost 1,000 last fall). The acquisition of new head coach Andy Reid was supposed to make it easier for Wilson to make the team, as Reid actually employs a fullback (unlike his predecessor Romeo Crennel did last year). Someone is going to get that roster spot this fall.
However, the Chiefs made a startling move today by trading CB Javier Arenas to Arizona in exchange for Sherman. The trade doesn’t necessarily indicate Kansas City is determined for someone else to win the spot over Wilson – the Chiefs have been beefing up their secondary all summer and Arenas was probably on the chopping block anyway. Sherman was simply the best player they could trade for. Yet best deal or not, the roster move certainly complicates things for a player that tens of thousands of fans were hoping to watch play Sundays at Arrowhead. We’ll be sure to keep an eye on this and other training camp battles around the league as the summer progresses.