The Kansas City Chiefs have Dontari Poe under contract for one more season. What happens after that? GM John Dorsey tells the KC Star's Terez Paylor that the two sides have talked and Dorsey indicated that the Chiefs do want to keep him in Kansas City.
Go over the Star and read Terez's full report. What stood out to me was Dorsey saying the Chiefs will get to Poe "eventually".
Why not right now? Because Dorsey is a busy dude right now. The franchise tag deadline is on Tuesday where the Chiefs could use the tag on Eric Berry or Sean Smith, who are both scheduled to be free agents. Ideally the Chiefs can strike a long-term deal with Berry ahead of time to keep the option of the tag on other players available. Dorsey also has to decide what to do with key veterans Derrick Johnson and Tamba Hali, who are both also fan favorites. Additionally, the Chiefs have Jaye Howard and Mike DeVito hitting free agency.
So, yeah, you can see how Poe's deal might drop to the bottom of that list considering the Chiefs have already exercised their 2016 fifth year option on him. Poe will make just over $6 million next season. Terez's report names the Buffalo Bills' Marcell Dareus as a potential contract comparison which if so ... holy crap, that's a lot of money. Dareus got $96 million over six years, including $60 million guaranteed. The good news here is that the cap is going up each year at a fairly significant rate. Another $10-15 million bump and that contract doesn't look so big.
Still, Poe is going to be expensive. Very expensive. He does play most snaps and doesn't get injured much - even when he is injured, he returns quickly as he showed after back surgery last summer - so there's a good argument that he deserves that much.