Andy Reid’s extension is a well-deserved reward for his legacy

Andy Reid’s six-year extension is a well-deserved reward for his incredible legacy.

On Monday, news leaked that the Kansas City Chiefs have a deal in place to extend both general manager Brett Veach and head coach Andy Reid for six more years of football.

After bringing the AFC Championship game to Arrowhead two years in a row, Andy Reid won the Lamar Hunt trophy on the Chiefs home turf and then delivered the Lombardi Trophy in February. This extension serves to reward Reid for all the success he has brought to the Chiefs organization and the Hunt family.

Reid was initially signed in 2013, after the Chiefs went 2-14 in the 2012 season under head coach Romeo Crennel, who had won the job after taking over as interim coach. Before Crennel’s one and done season, the Chiefs had struggled under head coach Todd Haley, who served from 2009 to 2011 with only a .422 winning percentage.

The Chiefs struggled to find much success after the turn of the century, save for one 10 win season with Todd Haley in 2010 and a 13 win season under Dick Vernell, the Chiefs’ head coach from 2001 to 2005. The Chiefs went through seven different starting quarterbacks in just 11 seasons, and only been to the playoffs three times, never making it past wild-card weekend.

That all changed when the Andy Reid came to Kansas City.

Since 2013, Andy Reid has a .688 winning percentage, which is the highest winning percentage of any Kansas City Chiefs’ head coach (the only other coach to win a Super Bowl for the Chiefs, Hank Stram, takes second at .618). The Chiefs have had two starting quarterbacks over the past six seasons, Alex Smith and Patrick Mahomes, and have made the playoffs in each of the last five seasons—the second longest streak in franchise history.

Reid has coached the third most games for the franchise. Assuming he coaches every game for the next six seasons, he will have coached the most games as the Chiefs’ head coach with 213 games (to clarify some math here, due to the new CBA this season is only 16 games long, but starting next season, the season becomes 17 games long, meaning five seasons at 17 and one at 16). If he can win at the same .688 clip, the Chiefs will win 69 games, giving him the most wins as the Kansas City Chiefs’ head coach at 146 wins. This is all despite being the third-longest tenured head coach at the moment, and being only the second-longest tenured at the end of this extension.

Reid’s extension is not only important in terms of wins and tenure. It’s also vital to the development of many players and coaches.

It is no secret that the Reid’s coaching tree is one of the best coaching lineages in sports (after the Greg Popovich tree, although it is significantly smaller than Pops). Names like Doug Pederson in Philadelphia, Ron Rivera in Washington, Sean McDermott in Buffalo, Matt Nagy in Chicago, and John Harbaugh in Baltimore are all head coaches in the NFL thanks to their prior roles alongside Reid, and barring another gross overlook of Eric Bieniemy next offseason, another branch will be forming in 2021. Even Reid’s own defensive coordinator, Steve Spagnoulo, comes from his school of coaching.

There are a few coaches currently on the Chiefs’ coaching staff that will probably be joining Bieniemy in the next few years. If it were not for Reid’s ability to block teams from pursuing him, Chiefs’ quarterback coach Mike Kafka would be an offensive coordinator somewhere right now. Spagnoulo maybe a bit older than most organizations are hiring right now, but if he can continue to find success for the Chiefs defense, he will certainly gain some attention in the next few years.

Above the coaches, however, are the players on the Chiefs’ roster that will benefit from Reid’s extension.

After signing his record-setting 10-year contract, Patrick Mahomes spoke to the media about how he had a conversation with his head coach and mentor before signing the extension. He wanted to make sure that Big Red was not planning on retiring anytime soon and would be around for the majority of his contract. It’s obvious that the most talented offensive player in the league needs the most talented offensive mind in the NFL to be the best player he can be.

Tyreek Hill needed someone to believe in him after a toxic relationship had potentially cost him his future in sports, and coach Reid was that person. Even in the midst of his scandal during the 2019 offseason, Reid stood by his player and trusted him while the fans and local media dragged him through the mud on very little evidence. Furthermore, it is largely because of Reid’s genius and innovative offense that Hill has managed to find so much success early in his career.

There are plenty of yound offensive players on the Chiefs’ roster that need a relationship with Reid and his offensive brilliance to help them find success: Mecole Hardman, Darwin Thompson, Jody Fortson, Darrel Williams, Lucas Niang, and, of course, Clyde Edwards-Helaire. These relationships are kept intact as long as Reid is kept in K.C.

Reid has a way of developing trust with his players, a trait that is unmatched by any other coach in the NFL. It is that trait, along with his creative mind, his ability to lead, and his dedication to the Chiefs’ organization, that made his extension so important—and so well-deserved.