In this special offseason series, we analyze the best players in Kansas City Chiefs history to wear every single uniform number. Here’s No. 24.
An abundance. A plethora. A veritable cornucopia. You get the idea
The No. 24 has been am embarrassment of riches, a treasure trove. There I go again.
When you read the nominees for this particular number below, you will understand, but it’s just sad that some guys won’t get the notice they deserve because they wore a particular number. That’s just the way this works, however, so we’ll just get on with it. Lots of good, very good and even great players have wore this number.
Here’s to ’em.
The Others
A Hall of Famer won’t be on this list, but only because he didn’t play all that long in Kansas City. A future Hall of Famer won’t be on this list because he played even less (and even then wasn’t that great in K.C.). Still, this number is loaded.
Ty Law is the former, a man who certainly played excellent football over two seasons for the Chiefs but whose prime years were spent elsewhere. Even in a Hall of Fame career, Law’s two years in K.C. weren’t good enough to make him in the top two. The same is same for Darrelle Revis, the latter who was rather uninspiring in a short burst of work last season—perhaps his last ever NFL reps.
Others certainly deserve to be mentioned. J.C. Pearson played 90 games in the Chiefs secondary and special teams. Caesar Belser played 56. William Bartee logged time in 87 games. Fred Williamson played well in the late ’60s. All of these are now just asterisks because they aren’t either of the following.
The Runner-up: Brandon Flowers
The 2008 NFL Draft was a special one for the Chiefs, and as a fan, it was a lot of fun to see the Brandons grow in the defensive backfield. Brandon Flowers and Brandon Carr were taken in the second and fifth rounds, respectively in ’08 and went on to earn serious paydays in the league.
Flowers stayed the longest in K.C. between the two, a total of six years with the Chiefs and another three seasons with the Chargers in an impressive nine year career. He was an immediate starter as a rookie and went on to start 87 total games in K.C., a fixture in the secondary for over a half decade. He intercepted 17 passes for the Chiefs and returned 3 of them for touchdowns. He also earned his only Pro Bowl nod with K.C. in 2013.
The Winner: Gary Green
A recent electee into the Kansas City Chiefs Hall of Fame in 2015, Gary Green’s career played out exactly how the team hoped it would when they selected him in the first round at No. 10 overall in 1977. After starring at Baylor, the Chiefs chose Green to help lock down their secondary, and he immediately settled in outside opposite a man named Emmitt Thomas.
Green made the all-rookie team in ’77 and over the course of the next 9 seasons, was named an All-Pro five times and a Pro Bowler four times. He intercepted 33 career passes, 24 of them with the Chiefs, and started 131 games total in his career. He spent his last two years in the NFL with the Rams.
If you want to know just how feared Green was in his prime, check out this quote:
"“There were times when I actually got bored because no one would throw at me,” said Green. “I knew Cliff Branch real well with the Oakland Raiders, and after one game, I said, ‘Cliff, come on, man, you’re not even throwing at me,’ and he said, the first thing they talked about in the Monday morning meeting was, ‘You can’t go at Green.’"
Among a strong cornerback lot, Green was good enough to outshine them all.
Next: The Best to Wear It: No. 23
Congratulations to Gary Green for being the greatest Chiefs player to ever wear the No. 24 on his uniform!