Kansas City Chiefs head coach Andy Reid is known as a warm, friendly character, but he was almost anything but earlier this week when asked about Tyreek Hill’s comments in a preview of the wide receiver’s forthcoming podcast.
Reid bristled at a reporter who asked him about the comments, with Big Red dismissing it as a “dumb question” before promptly moving along.
Former Chiefs wide receiver Hill and his agent, Drew Rosenhaus, are featuring in an upcoming episode of the It Needed To Be Said podcast, a preview of which was posted on social media.
It was rare to see Kansas City Chiefs head coach Andy Reid so unnerved when asked about Tyreek Hill’s recent podcast clip.
In the short, 35-second clip Hill and Rosenhaus talk about how the star wideout wanted to stay in Kansas City. “Once the season was over, we reached out to the Chiefs and we said ‘hey, we want to keep it going,” Rosenhaus said “Tyreek wanted to be there. Tyreek wanted to be in Kansas City.”
Hill jumped in. “Yes. Yes. Say that again. Tyreek wanted to be in KC,” Hill said. “Wanted. Want-ed to be in KC, man.”
“We tried to do an extension with them,” Rosenhaus said.
The clip ends with a loaded question, suggesting the Chiefs might have tried to “suppress” Hill’s stats to potentially decrease his value. It cuts off before Hill or Rosenhaus answer.
Reid was asked if he had heard the comments and what he thought of them, and he did not take kindly to it.
“I haven’t, but you are good at asking those questions, shock jock, you know,” Reid said. “It’s a dumb question but that’s alright, we’ll go on to another one … Especially if you know I haven’t heard it.”
The reporter tries to follow up, but Reid dismisses the question again, ending with “whatever”.
It was an ice-cold response from Big Red, who is normally warm and calm when speaking to anyone, including the media.
His response is an interesting one. It’s hard to tell exactly why the question seemed to irk him so much, but there are a few possibilities.
The question from the reporter started with “Coach, I hate to ask you about something I’m not sure if you know about …” and maybe the premise behind that lead-in is what irked him. I mean, why ask Reid about something you aren’t sure if he’s aware of? Maybe the silliness of that ticked him off.
Reid didn’t flat out say he hadn’t heard the comments or that he wasn’t at least aware of them, and if he did in fact know about the clip, perhaps it was the premise behind the suggestions he was annoyed at.
This is just speculation, but maybe Reid was annoyed at the suggestion they suppressed Hill or didn’t offer him a sizeable enough contract, things he might know are blatantly untrue.
Or maybe Reid’s cold response had to do with LeSean McCoy’s comments last week.
McCoy took a swipe at Chiefs offensive coordinator Eric Bieniemy and his inability to land a job as a head coach, saying it was his coaching ability that was costing him the gig. Reid defended Bieniemy when asked about McCoy’s comments, and perhaps that is what led to his response to questions on what Hill said. Maybe he is simply sick of being asked about what disgruntled former players have to say about his team.
Hill’s comments accomplish nothing. They simply seem like an attempt to make his former employers look bad. I can’t speak for Reid, but as a Chiefs fan, hearing those comments from Hill doesn’t sit well with me If Hill truly wanted to be in Kansas City, then he would be. It’s as simple as that.
If being the highest-paid wide receiver in the NFL is more important than being a key piece in a perennial Super Bowl contender while still getting paid an awful lot of money, then so be it. Hill has made his choice.
The fact that Hill left because he wanted a bigger deal while other players in K.C. have said they are more than willing to earn less if it helps the team win annoys me as a Chiefs fan.
And who knows, maybe the suggestion that Hill left for any reason other than that annoyed Reid too.