Patrick Mahomes says NIL could have changed trajectory of his Chiefs career
The 2017 NFL Draft is the stuff of legends in Kansas City.
The Chiefs traded picks in the 2017 first round (27th overall) and third round (91st overall), along with their 2018 first-round pick, to the Bills for the 10th overall choice. The Chiefs then wasted no time in selecting quarterback Patrick Mahomes out of Texas Tech.
It was a franchise altering trade for the Chiefs, who have won three Super Bowls since that day.
But what if Mahomes wasn’t in the draft that year? He had skipped his senior season at Texas Tech to enter the 2017 NFL Draft. In an Q&A shared by the NFL on X, Mahomes talked about how things would have been different had their been name, image and likeness (NIL) money available to him at Tech.
Mahomes was asked: “If NIL were around when you were in college, what would your deal have been?”
His response: “It would have been a good amount of money, especially for Lubbock, Texas. If I would have been able to get NIL, I probably would have stayed for my senior year, and who knows what the rest of my NFL history would have been?”
Would the Chiefs still have drafted Mahomes a year later? Possibly. But a strong senior season at Tech may have put Mahomes on another team’s radar. And it’s possible the Chiefs could have drafted Deshaun Watson in 2017.
It’s an intriguing “What If” question.
In the video, Mahomes also talked about how he would have loved playing with wide receiver Randy Moss, why he enjoys facing the Las Vegas Raiders, his desire to have a Chiefs game played in Madrid, Spain, and his goal to win as many Super Bowl championships as possible.
This story was originally published August 22, 2024 at 8:59 AM.
