Tamba Hali pops up on the Chiefs injury report; more Dee Ford?

The Kansas City Chiefs added LB Tamba Hali to the injury report this week as he did not practice on Thursday with a knee injury. I'm not sure if this is a situation where Tamba is getting a rest or something is actually wrong. We shall see on Friday afternoon when the Chiefs list his status for the game.

Tamba's name on the injury report leads me to something I've been wondering. With the 1-4 start, would the Chiefs be better off giving more playing time to Dee Ford to get a better idea of what he can do?  Currently Tamba is playing the majority of the snaps while Ford is getting a dozen or more snaps a game. Ford doesn't have a full time role but it's more than last year.

I wonder about this because Tamba took a pay cut to come back this year and the structure of that contract doesn't seem to make it likely he will be back next year. Which means Dee Ford needs to be a full time player next year. Yeah, you'd hope your first round pick can be a full time player in year three but Ford has such few NFL snaps relative to other first round picks.

It might be hard to reduce Tamba's snaps in order to give Ford more playing time. This knee injury could be just the thing that gets Ford on the field more often (although I certainly don't want Tamba to be hurt). And I would be very curious to see how he does.

You can check out the Vikings injury report here.

The rest of the Chiefs injury report heading into Vikings week...

Did not practice

LB Tamba Hali (knee)

LB Josh Mauga (groin / Achilles)

NT Dontari Poe (ankle)

Full practice

CB Jamell Fleming (elbow)

TE Travis Kelce (groin / neck)

TE James O'Shaughnessy (hand)

TE Brian Parker (finger)