Pro Football Focus is continuing to unveil its top-101 players from the 2010s decade on Tuesday. As they continued their countdown on Tuesday, bringing us to 50 total players announced so far, three more Kansas City Chiefs players have been added. That brings the tally for current and former Chiefs players to eight.
Keep in mind, PFF is looking at the production, efficiency and impact of players during the 2010s decade in order to compile this list. There should be a few more players revealed in the coming days, but let’s go ahead and look at the newest Chiefs added and what was said about them by PFF’s Sam Monson.
No. 66 on the #PFFAllDecade101 @Mathieu_Era pic.twitter.com/g0pHSs46Wi
— PFF (@PFF) May 12, 2020
No. 66 – DB Tyrann Mathieu
“In a league of versatile offensive players, Mathieu stands out as a hybrid answer to the many problems presented by opposing offenses. He is half safety and half slot cornerback, bringing a skill set that gives great flexibility to his defensive coordinators. Mathieu has been a playmaker since his days at LSU, and that has continued at the NFL level, where he has broken up 34 passes and picked off 17. At his peak, Mathieu is the perfect slot defender for today’s NFL, where he’s not only sound in coverage, but he also has three years with 80.0-plus grades as a run defender, allowing his defense to stop the run while maintaining coverage flexibility on the back end. His best season came in 2015, where his 90.7 PFF grade, seven pass breakups and five interceptions had Mathieu in the NFL Defensive Player of the Year conversation.“
Mathieu also should have been in the NFL Defensive Player of the Year conversation in 2019, his only season thus far with the Chiefs. Yes, most of Mathieu’s dominance during the decade came away from Kansas City when he was with the Arizona Cardinals. We’re still claiming him, though, because he’s set to be in Kansas City for the foreseeable future.
Few players in this decade have had the type of versatility that Mathieu has in his game. We’re talking about a player that lines up everywhere from deep safety to linebacker spots. He’s an all-around defensive weapon and the Chiefs really have given him a lot of freedom within the scheme to do what he does best, which is getting after the football.