KC Chiefs: On real lives and roster cuts

There was a moment today, when wondering whether or not Jody Fortson would make the active roster for the 10th time, that I recalled our conversation from a few years ago. In that moment, it dawned on me just how far Fortson has come in his pursuit of professional football and that the NFL’s roster cut deadline wasn’t just about quickly learning who was in or out.

In case you’re unfamiliar with Fortson’s story, it’s been a long road to even try out for the National Football League, let alone to have a very real shot to make the most talented team in the game. He attended two different junior colleges before earning a lone football scholarship from Valdosta State.

During his freshman year, he lost a father figure in his uncle, who he said was the one who practiced with him every day at 6:00 a.m. back in Buffalo, New York. From there, his mother broke her hip which meant having to transfer schools and interrupting his career, and after that came a lost season due to academic ineligibility. The idea of playing in the NFL sounded silly most years he was suiting up to play football.

Every roster cut is the long-held dream of a player set aside.

This isn’t about Fortson specifically, but in a way it is. Every player has this sort of back story driving them to compete day in and day out at practice in training camp. Every player has long-held dreams of playing the game they love at the highest level. Every player has gone all-in on pursuing the rare opportunity to play professional football, abandoning family functions and friend hangouts in order to keep practicing that much more.

Up until the final bell—that is, the notice from a team’s personnel saying they made the active roster or not—each player is told by his agent, his trainers, his family and friends to focus on what they can control. It’s the culmination of days and weeks and months of relentless workouts and endless film study. They’ve all ran in one direction for so long in the hopes of making it to the ultimate finish line, yet for so many, they’ll come up this short in the end.

When thinking about Fortson or others like him, it dawned on me that a simple tweet saying “[Player name] has been released by the Chiefs” represents much more than just the latest bit of information about my favorite team. For some, it’s the latest hurdle. For others, it will represent the final push toward an unrealized dream.

To all those Chiefs players who will likely be overlooked as just another transaction to come across the wire for most, we sincerely wish you the best going forward. It’d be wonderful to see many former Chiefs players find new homes with other teams if they can’t live out their dreams in K.C. And for those who call it quits, we hope the pursuit of the dream was worth the experience in the end.