Chiefs bring back cornerback L'Jarius Sneed on a 1-year, $5M deal after injury-plagued Titans stint

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — The Chiefs and L'Jarius Sneed are reuniting on a one-year, $5 million contract that gives the veteran cornerback a reset after an injury-plague tenure in Tennessee while bringing some depth and stability to the Kansas City defensive backfield.

The move came as the Chiefs opened their three-day mandatory minicamp Tuesday.

Sneed was a fourth-round pick of the Chiefs in 2020 who quickly earned a starting job and eventually helped the franchise win two Super Bowls. He was traded to the Titans in March 2024, when it became clear the Chiefs could not afford Sneed on a long-term deal, and he parlayed his success in Kansas City into a four-year deal that averaged $19.4 million per season.

But a knee injury hampered Sneed throughout his time in Tennessee. He played only 12 games combined in 2024 and 2025 without any interceptions, and he was placed on injured reserve last October with a quadriceps injury.

The Titans released him in March in a move that saved them $11.4 million in salary cap space.

Away from the field, Sneed had been indicted last November by a Texas grand jury on a misdemeanor charge of failure to report a felony aggravated assault that allegedly occurred in December 2024. His attorney said last month that the charge had been dropped.

The Chiefs have rebuilt the vast majority of their defensive backfield since last season. They traded star cornerback Trent McDuffie — who like Sneed a couple of years ago would have been too expensive too keep — to the Rams for a package of draft picks, then lost cornerbacks Jaylen Watson (Rams) and Josh Williams (Titans) and safety Bryan Cook (Bengals) in free agency.

In their place, Kansas City traded up to make Mansoor Delane the first cornerback chosen in the draft with the sixth pick. The Chiefs also signed cornerbacks Kader Kohou and Kaiir Elam along with safety Alohi Gilman in free agency.

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