Patrick Mahomes had some help ahead of the pivotal conversation with Andy Reid that eventually drafted him to the Kansas City Chiefs. Mahomes stopped by the New Heights podcast, hosted by teammate Travis Kelce and his brother Jason, where he shared a key reason for his selection and revealed that he had received help from a Chiefs coach during the drafting process.
Mahomes told the Kelce brothers that he had a meeting with the Chiefs’ head coach where they talked for hours about plays. Luckily for Mahomes, he had an edge when former Chiefs offensive coordinator Matt Nagy told him which games to study ahead of time.
Mahomes’ big reveal
“If you all let me go under 12, I’ll be drafted by someone else.”
This @PatrickMahomes Design stories are overwhelming 🤯
THE PATRICK MAHOMES EPISODE featuring @JasonKelce & @tkelce is out NOW: https://t.co/ZlYmHA5kwB pic.twitter.com/sOW0iLmA6I
— New Heights (@newheightshow) December 1, 2022
“I was at the facility,” Mahomes said. “We had the meetings, like the top 30 visits, so I was there like five hours. Matt Nagy, who was the offensive coordinator at the time, really liked me, so he gave me the plays that they wanted to go over the night before. Well, Coach Reid is finding out now, on New Heights. So of course I canceled the meeting. I stayed up all night studying these pieces.”
Nagy’s submission worked when the Chiefs picked the Texas Tech quarterback 10th overall in the 2017 draft. When Reid found out the truth about his former assistant coach’s tips, he reacted to the revelation.
Reid’s “Shock & Awe” moment
Here is #bosses Andy Reid reacts @ByNateTaylor‘s question to Mahomes and Nagy snooping before the draft and @HerbieTeope‘s question on Justin Reid’s comments this week.
Think this team is now ready to play. pic.twitter.com/P1wNyKA6Tz
— PJ Green (@PJGreenTV) December 2, 2022
“Are you serious? Gosh, I didn’t know that. Man, I would never have taken him,” Reid jokingly told reporters.
During a press appearance Thursday, the media asked Nagy if he would provide Mahomes with the help he needed to seal the deal with the Chiefs.
“Yeah, maybe a little bit,” laughed Nagy. “It’s always a unique and fun process,” Nagy told reporters. “Every year you prepare for different positions and different players etc. It’s such a long and grueling process. [But] I think it’s pretty safe to say that there was a big consensus in our building about who we liked.
“All I know is that Coach Reid and [then-personnel analyst and current general manager Brett] Veach and a lot of other people in this building really liked Patrick, including me. Everyone has a process of what they are going through. We were able to go through some plays for ourselves. The coach has a phenomenal evaluation process for a lot of different positions — but I especially love his process of evaluating quarterbacks — and that was just part of the process.
Nagy made it clear that other quarterbacks were eligible, but Mahomes was the one who stood out during Reid’s quarterback evaluation process.
“I thought Patrick did a damn good job on the test,” said Nagy. “Coach asked him good questions about the plays – and Patrick? He knew what he was doing. It was impressive. I know how much they loved him [in the] Preliminary design process,” said Nagy. “We were all so infatuated with him — I mean, Coach and Veach and [then-general manager John Dorsey] Dorse – all these guys.”
Nagy bet correctly. Mahomes was named the NFL MVP in his sophomore year in the league and has been among the top NFL quarterbacks since joining the league.
