KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- From his first NFL play, when he made an interception, Marcus Peters showed his time with the Kansas City Chiefs would be uncommon. He didn't disappoint in that regard.
Peters continued to show his ability. He wasn't always intent on just covering his receiver. More than once in three seasons with the Chiefs, Peters peeled off the receiver he was covering to make an interception on a pass intended for someone a teammate was covering.
A cornerback with Peters' package of skills doesn't come to the NFL often, period, much less to one of its 32 teams. Peters is truly a once-in-a-generation player.
From that aspect, the trade the Chiefs arranged to send Peters to the Los Angeles Rams is puzzling. They're really trading Peters, who is 25 and plays one of the NFL's most important positions?
But, as with the Alex Smith trade, there are also some good reasons for the Chiefs to get rid of Peters. These reasons aren't quite as evident as they were with the Smith trade, though.
Peters had a strange season for the Chiefs in 2017, off the field and on it.
The Chiefs suspended him for a game for his bizarre behavior during a loss to the New York Jets. Peters picked an official's penalty flag off the field and tossed it into the stands. He then retreated to the locker room without being ejected. When he later returned to the Kansas City sideline, he wasn't in full uniform.
Peters also was involved in shouting matches with assistant coaches and directed an expletive toward a fan behind the bench at Arrowhead Stadium. He disappointed Chiefs chairman Clark Hunt for his refusal to stand during the national anthem last season, and the two later came to an agreement in which Peters stayed in the locker room until the anthem was finished.
Peters played his position well last season but suddenly developed a distaste for physical contact, as if he was playing not to get hurt. Some of his actions in his efforts to avoid contact bordered on the comical.
The Chiefs were getting to the point that they had to make a decision on Peters. The contract he signed as a first-round draft pick in 2015 has one year remaining, though the Chiefs could have extended it for another season by exercising the fifth-year option.
Either way, the Chiefs were soon going to have to pay Peters a lot of money or lose him. The Chiefs have a small sample size on what life without Peters might be like, but perhaps it's instructive. They struggled to play pass defense all season with Peters in their lineup as they finished 29th by allowing 247 yards per game.
During his one-game suspension, the Chiefs played one of their best defensive games of the season. They shut out the Oakland Raiders through three quarters and let down only in the final period after they resorted to a prevent defense.
The Chiefs in the end decided to get what they could for Peters now, when he has up to two seasons remaining on his contract and their asking price would be higher than if they waited until next year.
We'll find out as soon as next season whether they made the right call. But they had to make the choice now, and, from this vantage point, it doesn't look as if they made a bad one.