KANSAS CITY, Mo. — From his usual perch behind the secondary, Chiefs defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo waved for a safety, rookie Jaden Hicks, to join him for a conversation in the middle of practice. If you had your own chance to talk to Hicks, Spagnuolo would later share, you’d probably discover that, “It’s like, whoa,” for him right now.

There’s a lot to learn, in other words. But that’s also the purpose of these offseason camps: to educate. It’s the time to learn it.

This season, though, Spagnuolo has added a layer to the offseason programming in Kansas City — an intentional tone-setter, of sorts.

In a morning meeting with his defense, Spagnuolo opened mandatory minicamp by putting a chart on the big screen. He had shown the same graphic during organized team activities (OTAs), but with fuller attendance during the lone stretch of the offseason in which attendance is mandatory, he wanted to underscore it once more.

In the 2016 season, the graphic showed, Spagnuolo coached the No. 2-ranked defense in the NFL with the New York Giants. They were dominant.

But just one year later, after returning the same core, the Giants finished 27th.

The intention of telling the story:

“I felt like it was important to share it with them right away, because you have to start building. It’s a whole new year,” Spagnuolo said. “There are no guarantees that we will be the same. No guarantees.”

And the takeaway:

“Just how easy it is to get complacent,” defensive lineman Chris Jones said. “... It’s so easy to get complacent. It’s so easy to (think), ‘We’ll fix it later,’ especially when you come off such a high.”

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