[2] Kitchens ranked top ten in the long jump at both the American indoor and outdoor championships in his first year as a professional in 2006.

[5] He failed to build on this in 2010 and he finished out of the top ten at the USA Outdoors with his season's best mark of 7.64 m.[3] He started the 2012 season strongly at the Georgia Relays, winning with a wind-assisted jump of 8.27 m and setting a wind-legal personal record of 8.14 m.[6] He placed third at the Colorful Daegu Meeting and the Adidas Grand Prix meet in New York City.

[7] The following year he won his first and only national title at the 2013 USA Outdoor Track and Field Championships, recording a wind-assisted mark of 8.23 m. He set his season's best two weeks later in Chula Vista with a winning jump of 8.17 m. He again failed to take his form into international competition and was eliminated in the qualifying at the 2013 World Championships in Athletics with a jump of 7.75 m. After making a limited number of appearances in 2014 and 2015, he retired from competitive athletics.

[7] Following his retirement Kitchens was arrested for aggravated assault and gun threats against his mother and sister in June 2016, after making demands for money.

Kitchens had suffered violence as a child including being shot in the chest and arm at the age of 12 in an attack in which his sister was also paralyzed.