How the Packers’ last visit to Arrowhead helped Andy Reid become the Chiefs’ coach
How did the Green Bay Packers help Andy Reid become the Chiefs’ coach?
It goes back to 2011, the last time the Packers visited Arrowhead Stadium.
The Packers entered that game 13-0 and had won 19 straight. The week of the game, Chiefs fired coach Todd Haley and named defensive coordinator Romeo Crennel as the interim. Also, Kyle Orton, picked up a month earlier, made his first start for the Chiefs.
Then something crazy happened. The Chiefs won 19-14. It was the biggest moment in a 2-1 finish to the season that prompted the Chiefs to lift the interim tag from Crennel. The next year proved to be a disaster, and perhaps that would have been the case no matter who was the coach. But Crennel was fired after the Chiefs’ 2-14 season in 2012, and Clark Hunt hired Reid.
That Chiefs-Packers game is the only pro game Aaron Rodgers has played at Arrowhead Stadium, but he has some happier memories of the stadium from college.
Rodgers’ first appearance in a major college game occurred at Arrowhead. He was the reserve quarterback for California, which opened the 2003 season against Kansas State at Arrowhead.
Rodgers, who had played junior-college football as a freshman, transferred to Cal. He didn’t start but entered the game and threw a fourth-quarter touchdown pass in K-State’s 42-28 victory. The Wildcats went on to win the Big 12 championship game, also at Arrowhead, that season.
On the K-State roster that year was a freshman who took a redshirt season, Jordy Nelson. A few years later, Rodgers and Nelson would begin a decade as one of football’s most productive combinations. When Nelson left Green Bay after the 2017 season — he retired a year later — Rodgers had completed 470 passes to him, including 65 touchdowns.
Kickoff: 7:22 p.m., Arrowhead Stadium
TV/radio: NBC (Ch. 41), KCFX (101.1 FM)
Line: Packers by 3.5
Blair Kerkhoff’s prediction: Packers, 31-27