Tershawn Wharton Exits Game vs. Raiders With Injury

Entering Monday night's game, Wharton had played the second-most defensive snaps among all Chiefs defensive tackles. His 52.7% clip entering Week 5 topped his totals from both 2020 (48%) and 2021 (45%). The Missouri S&T product was less than a quarter of the way through his 38th career NFL game and in those previous 37 outings, he recorded 10 quarterback hits, five sacks, three forced fumbles and a pass broken up.

Without Wharton and considering that Danna was already ruled out in advance of the game, Kansas City could turn to Khalen Saunders to replace some of Wharton's pass-rush production. The fourth-year man has been seeing the field a decent amount this season, flashing some of his athleticism, and also had a strong preseason slate that allowed him to make the Chiefs' initial 53-man roster out of training camp. Following the Chiefs' Week 3 loss to the Colts, I wrote about how Saunders' role and play could impact both him and the team:

Some personnel groupings and opposing offensive lines call for different deployments of players. That much is obvious, and Saunders won't always have a 30% workload on defense with the likes of Tershawn Wharton, Derrick Nnadi and even Mike Danna (once he returns from injury) working along the interior of Steve Spagnuolo's defensive line.

With that said, Saunders was able to make a significant impact in a reserve role against the Colts. That's something that hasn't been said enough about him throughout his career in Kansas City and in a contract year, he'll need more games like that in order to justify sticking around long-term. The Chiefs' defense put up one heck of an effort on Sunday, and Saunders was a serious part of that.