The Kansas City Chiefs aren’t sure if they’re going to have their star safety in the line-up when they face the Chargers to open the season.
Despite the team’s best efforts to rest their star safety, the Kansas City Chiefs might be without Eric Berry on Sunday when they start the regular season against the Los Angeles Chargers.
On Sunday, it will be one full year exactly since the last time the Kansas City Chiefs had Eric Berry in the line-up—in the 2017 season-opener against New England in which Berry not only showed why he’s the best while shutting down Rob Gronkowski but he also went down with a torn Achilles.
The team was hoping he would be able to go on Sunday after sitting much of the preseason with a sore heel. Th team was cautious throughout the last month or even more with Berry in the hopes that the heel injury would go away, but when asked about it on Monday, Andy Reid just said the following:
"“We’ll see. It’s day-to-day. We’ll see how it goes.”"
Just like that, any level of real optimism should likely be tossed out the window. The Chiefs aren’t going to officially close the door if they don’t have to, but there’s little reason to believe that Berry will be ready since he hasn’t ramped up his activities in practice. It might help in some limited way to keep the Chargers guessing about his availability, but it looks like Berry is more likely to sit for Sunday’s game than he is to suit up.
Nothing is certain yet, obviously, but if the Chiefs have to go with someone else, it would be interesting to see if Ron Parker takes over his old free safety spot after re-signing or if Armani Watts remains and Parker slips over. Eric Murray and Jordan Lucas are also available, but Lucas is brand new to the scheme having just come over in a deal with the Miami Dolphins this weekend. Any potential absence from Berry also magnifies the fact that Dan Sorensen is also unavailable.
We’ll keep you posted with any further updates on Berry’s condition or playing status.