Alex Smith says he knew early on that Chiefs’ Patrick Mahomes had the ‘it’ factor
Long before he became the Chiefs starting quarterback and wowed the NFL with his no-look passes and other amazing abilities, Patrick Mahomes caught the attention of Alex Smith.
The Chiefs drafted Mahomes in 2017 and he was a backup to Smith, who helped the Chiefs to a 10-6 record, an AFC West championship and four straight wins to end that season.
While Smith guided the team to the postseason, Mahomes was on the scout team, causing headaches for the Chiefs defense.
Smith recounted the time during an interview on the “10 Questions With Kyle Brandt” podcast.
The ‘It’ Factor
Brandt asked when Smith knew there was something different about Mahomes.
“Towards the end of the year he started doing a lot, you could tell he started to really settle in with the pro game and was really getting comfortable and confident, seeing things and making throws,” Smith recalled. “He would start doing the no-look stuff then at practice as a rookie, and he would throw no-look slants and no-look balls in there, and he would hit them and he would hit them a lot.
“It wasn’t like it was some fluke thing, and I think you could just see the game slow down for him, and he had such good vision that you could tell he had ‘it.’ He had ‘it.’ It’s that thing you always wonder about with any football player but it’s especially quarterbacks, right? We have all the measurables — height, weight, 40s (40-yard dash), arm strength, all these things, accuracy — and really ultimately it just kind of comes down to when the bullets are flying, can you process, can you make the throws, all those things and that’s kind of ‘it.’ And you could tell he had ‘it.’”
That “it” factor is not the only reason why Mahomes has found such success at a young age, Smith said. Although Mahomes is just 25 years old, he has already won an NFL MVP award, a Super Bowl MVP award, appeared in two Super Bowls and has a 38-8 record as a starter.
In the playoffs, Mahomes has led the Chiefs to six victories in eight games.
Smith said Mahomes is not just talented, he’s a “good kid.”
“I think on top of all that, though, he’s a guy that every single day showed up early,” Smith said. “He was hungry, soaked up everything, great dude, competitive. Loved coming to work. He’s a ball guy. There’s a lot of guys that try to play football because they think it’s a means to the limelight for them. They think they get famous through football. And then there’s also guys that are just really good at football and love football and are therefore famous. And that’s Patrick.
“Patrick loves sports, loves football, loves competing and he’s so good at it, that as a byproduct he’s obviously famous. And there’s a lot of guys in this league that are in it for the other reasons. ... He’s just such a good dude, good kid. He’s got a great head on his shoulders.
“Certainly at the end of that year at practice, you could continue to see him make throws that were like, that was pretty sweet. He’d make these sweet plays in practice all the time.”
Smith said he sometimes would watch the clips of the Chiefs defense playing against Mahomes and it was fun to see some of those crazy throws.
While it was clear Mahomes was going to be the Chiefs starter sooner rather than later, Smith said the time in the quarterback room was a lot of fun.
“For me at that point, I felt like I was in such a good place in the sense that I knew,” Smith said. “You know, when you’re that far in your career, I was in my 13th year, you’re basically playing where it’s a one-year audition at a time. Like if you’re not good enough, they’re gonna go find someone somewhere else, whether it was through the draft or free agency or whatever. So for me, I felt good about it. I just needed to do what I needed to do. ‘And part of that was not worrying about Pat or anybody else. I needed to go down my path and continue to focus on that.
“And it was great. I thought there was such a mutual respect between him and I from the get-go. So it never was awkward. I think it was obviously, how it could have been. I mean, everybody was trying to pit us against each other and compare us to one another, but it was obviously refreshing to not go down that path.”
Praise for his wife
Smith’s path took him to Washington, where he was the starter after being acquired in a trade.
Washington was 6-3 when Smith suffered the devastating leg injury that not only nearly cost him his career, but also his leg and his life.
After sitting out the entire 2019 season, Smith worked his way back to Washington and was a backup last year. But he eventually was 5-1 as a starter, helping his team win the NFC East title.
Smith talked in the podcast about how much he leaned on his wife, Elizabeth, who was by his side as he recovered while trying to maintain a sense of a normal life for the couple’s three kids.
“My wife spent every single night but one in the hospital with me through all of that, and I’m super thankful for the extended family and friends that helped us out through that time,” Smith said. “But when I came home, man, we had a wheelchair van rented, she had put ramps all through our house so I could get around. She had decked out the house so I could get where I needed to go.
“I had a PICC line (peripherally inserted central catheter) going to my heart. She was doing my push IVs twice a day. I had five other shots I had to get, medications I was on, so not only was I completely helpless and good for nothing, but I was a huge drain on the household. And so for her to juggle all those things, she didn’t blink, she wasn’t even fazed. And then I think for me even more importantly, when I did get to start doing some of my rehab how much she helped me celebrate all those little victories along the way.
“Like little milestones that she would make a big deal out of, her and the kids, and how much that helped me celebrate those things as I was doing it, because it was kind of a slog for a while as I was slogging through some of those things. It was slow moving and she was so great helping me kind of put a lot of those in perspective, those little milestones.”
You can listen to the entire interview here and there is much more about his recovery and other interesting topics.
This story was originally published February 18, 2021 at 8:27 AM.
