Super Bowl MVP Kenneth Walker III Signs Record $45 Million Contract With Kansas City Chiefs After Seattle Seahawks Let Him Walk
Kenneth Walker III spent four seasons turning the Seattle Seahawks into Super Bowl champions. Kansas City got the bill. The reigning Super Bowl MVP has signed with the Chiefs on a three-year deal worth up to $45 million — the largest contract ever given to a running back in NFL free agency — just weeks after running for 135 yards against that same Kansas City defense in Super Bowl LX.
Kenneth Walker Contract Details: Three Years, $45 Million, $28.7 Million Guaranteed
The deal carries a base value of $43.05 million at $14.35 million per year, with $28.7 million fully guaranteed and a max value of $45 million. Walker is now the fourth-highest-paid running back in the league.
Seattle, unwilling to place the franchise tag on Walker, watched him confirm the deal himself on social media Monday. No extended negotiation. No drama. The Seahawks built a champion around him and then let him walk straight to a conference rival.
Why Kansas City Needed Kenneth Walker III Desperately
The Chiefs ranked 25th in the NFL last season in rushing yards per game at 106.6 and 20th in yards per carry at 4.21. No Kansas City running back averaged more than four yards per carry. They failed to surpass the 100-yard rushing mark in each of the final four games of a season that saw them miss the playoffs for the first time since Andy Reid's second year with the franchise.
Patrick Mahomes is also recovering from a torn ACL, making an elite ground game not just desirable but necessary. Walker does not merely fill a roster hole — he transforms the offense's identity.
Mahomes offered a two-word public reaction to the signing — brief, but the enthusiasm behind Kansas City's biggest free-agency move in years needed no elaboration.
What Walker Did in Seattle — And What He Did to the Chiefs
Walker leaves Seattle after four seasons with over 3,500 rushing yards, 29 rushing touchdowns, and 1,005 receiving yards. His 2025 regular season was methodical — 221 carries for 1,027 yards at 4.6 yards per carry, five touchdowns, and 31 catches for 282 yards. The playoffs were something else entirely.
Walker totaled 65 postseason carries for 313 yards and four scores. In Super Bowl LX, he carried 27 times for 135 yards as Seattle beat New England 29-13. He became the first running back Super Bowl MVP since Terrell Davis.
The irony is not subtle. Kansas City — the team he dismantled on the sport's biggest stage — is now writing his checks.
Kenneth Walker III Contract Makes NFL History in Free Agency
Walker becomes the first Super Bowl MVP to sign with a new team the following offseason since safety Dexter Jackson left the Tampa Bay Buccaneers for Arizona in 2023. He was the top-ranked running back and sixth overall on the 2026 free-agent big board heading into the negotiating window.
The Chiefs had been seeking a dominant backfield presence for years — Kareem Hunt in 2017 was the last Kansas City running back to reach 1,000 yards. That nine-year drought ends the moment Walker puts on a helmet in Arrowhead.
Walker confirmed the deal with a social media post Monday afternoon. Andy Reid now has the Super Bowl MVP who just beat him handing off from a quarterback rehabbing his knee. That is either a masterstroke or a storyline the NFL could not have scripted better.
