Several Pro Bowl-caliber veteran players, including Cincinnati Bengals edge rusher Trey Hendrickson, Washington Commanders wide receiver Terry McLaurin and Dallas Cowboys edge rusher Micah Parsons, are in line to sign new deals before the 2025 regular season begins. The greatest sense of urgency exists for the Kansas City Chiefs with offensive guard Trey Smith, who was designated as a franchise player at the end of February.
This is because July 15 at 4 p.m. ET is the deadline for franchise players to sign multiyear contracts. After this deadline passes, players with franchise tags are prohibited from signing long-term deals until the end of the regular season on Jan. 4, 2026.
The Chiefs using a franchise tag on Smith was surprising. Interior offensive linemen rarely are given the designation.
Smith is only the fourth time a franchise designation has been placed on an offensive guard during the last 10 years. The Commanders used franchise tags on Brandon Scherff in both 2020 and 2021. The New England Patriots also made Joe Thuney a franchise player in 2020. Prior to those two, the last offensive guard to receive a franchise tag was Logan Mankins by the Patriots in 2011.
Usage on interior offensive linemen is so low because there aren’t specific franchise tag amounts for center, guard and tackle. The cost is the same regardless of position, which means left tackles primarily determine the number.
Smith quickly signed his franchise tender to make his $23.402 million fully guaranteed since this number doesn’t reflect the offensive guard market. The NFL’s highest-paid offensive guard is Landon Dickerson. He signed a four-year, $84 million contract extension, averaging $21 million per year, with the Philadelphia Eagles in March 2023. Salary escalators make Dickerson’s deal worth as much as $87 million.
Chiefs general manager Brett Veach made his intentions with Smith clear in April during his pre-draft press conference. Veach said: “There’s no secret that we’d like to get Trey locked up.”
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Smith possesses the leverage in contract negotiations thanks to his tag amount and the Chiefs trading Thuney, a first-team All-Pro left guard in both 2023 and 2024, to the Chicago Bears in March for a 2026 fourth-round pick. Thuney, who turns 33 in November, was heading into a contract year.
Smith should be hitting the open market in 2026 absent a new deal. The Chiefs will be hard-pressed to designate Smith as a franchise player for a second straight year because of the cost. Smith’s franchise tag in 2026 will be $28,082,400, which is 120% of the current $23.402 million amount.
History suggests Smith would have had stood a good chance to become the new salary benchmark for offensive guards if he had been able to hit the open market this year. A Pro Bowl-caliber guard in his prime has reset the market in free agency several times as an unrestricted free agent. It’s happened on five occasions dating to 2016 with Kelechi Osemele. The other four are Kevin Zeitler (2017), Andrew Norwell (2018), Thuney (2021) and Scherff (2022). Smith earned Pro Bowl honors for the first time last season.
Fortunately for Smith, the Chiefs haven’t had a problem resetting positional markets with offensive linemen. The five-year, $80 million contract Thuney signed made him the NFL’s highest-paid offensive guard at $16 million per year. Jawaan Taylor became the league’s first $20 million-per-year right tackle with the four-year, $80 million contract he received in 2023 free agency. The deal has $60 million in guarantees, of which $40 million was fully guaranteed at signing.
Creed Humphrey dramatically changed the pay scale for centers last preseason. He signed a four-year, $72 million extension, averaging $18 million per year. Humphrey’s $50.315 million in guarantees and $35 million fully guaranteed at signing are the most ever for a center.
Because of these factors, it really isn’t a matter of whether Smith will become the NFL’s highest-paid offensive guard if he signs a long-term deal by the July 15 deadline but by how big of a margin. It’s up to Kansas City to offer Smith the type of multiyear contract that will make him forego free agency next year.
Smith’s camp might view how the Chiefs treated fellow offensive guard Thuney when he joined the fold in 2021 most relevant. Thuney’s $16 million per year was 13.88% more than the four-year, $56.2 million extension, averaging $14.05 million per year, Brandon Brooks received from the Eagles during the middle of the 2019 season, which was the offensive guard standard at the time. Doing something similar for Smith would put him at almost $24 million per year.
The Chiefs will find the more recent dynamics, after the Indianapolis Colts massively reset the offensive guard market by 21.21% with Quenton Nelson’s four-year, $80 million extension, averaging $20 million per year in 2022, to their liking. Chris Lindstrom moved the needle by 2.5% in 2023. The Falcons gave Lindstrom a five-year, $102.5 million extension, averaging $20.5 million per year with $62.702 million in guarantees, where $48.202 million was fully guaranteed at signing.
Dickerson got 2.43% more than Lindstrom. Keeping Smith in line with Dickerson’s and Lindstrom’s increases would mean a deal in the $21.5 million-per-year neighborhood. For what it’s worth, the average increase the five unrestricted offensive guards received over the previous multiyear contract standard when setting the market is 9.88%. That type of increase would put Smith right around $23.075 million per year.
Record-setting guarantees may also be a necessity in order to get Smith to sign long term. Robert Hunt’s $63 million are the most overall guarantees for an offensive guard. He signed a five-year, $100 million contract, averaging $20 million per year, with the Carolina Panthers in 2023 free agency. Lindstrom’s $48.202 million is the mark with the amount fully guaranteed at signing. Nelson’s $31 million is the largest signing bonus ever given to an interior offensive lineman.
The Chiefs trying to utilize on Smith the approach used with offensive tackle Orlando Brown Jr. in 2022, when Brown was given a franchise tag, would be counterproductive at this point. Brown rejected a reported six-year, $139 million contract at the franchise player long-term deal deadline. He would have become the league’s highest-paid offensive lineman at $23,166,667 per year because of a highly inflated last year of the contract containing $44 million in 2027. The deal was backloaded and too long for the 26-year-old Brown. It was really $95 million over five years. Instead, Brown played under a $16.662 million franchise tag.
To turn down a four-year, $86 million contract, averaging $21.5 million per year, Smith’s camp would have to feel confident that he could command at least $62.598 million over three years for a $20.866 million average yearly salary next year on the open market. That’s the break-even point with this $21.5 million-per-year deal after playing the 2025 season under a $23.402 million franchise tag. The Chiefs using an extremely player-friendly structure is probably the best bet to get Smith to accept a deal closer to $21.5 million per year than averaging in the vicinity of his $23.402 million franchise tag.