Chiefs announce their six captains for the NFL postseason with a GQ-style photo
When the Chiefs played the Texans last month, three players with ties to Houston were chosen as KC’s captains.
DeAndre Hopkins, Justin Reid and Charles Omenihu all played for the Texans earlier in their careers, so it was a nice touch by the Chiefs.
There will be a new group of captains for the Chiefs’ rematch with the Texans on Saturday at GEHA Field at Arrowhead Stadium.
Teammates choose the captains, and the Chiefs announced that quarterback Patrick Mahomes, tight end Travis Kelce, defensive lineman Chris Jones, linebacker Nick Bolton, kicker Harrison Butker and long-snapper James Winchester will be captains for the playoffs.
The Chiefs shared a GQ-worthy photo of the captains.
Each player will wear a special patch on his jersey. There are four stars on the patch with a large letter “C.”
There is also a gold star for each year a player has been a captain. If a player has been a captain for more than four years, the entire patch is gold.
Here is a closer look at those different patches.
NFL players began wearing the patches in the 2007 season, although teams had captains for years before that.
The captains come out for the pre-game coin-toss and aid with communication among the team.
“We discussed the idea with many of the head coaches and they were very enthusiastic,” Ray Anderson, a former NFL executive vice president of football operations, said about the patches in a 2007 story on the league’s website. “Team captains are a key element in building team leadership and enhancing communication between players, coaches and management. A perfect example of the benefit of this kind of communication is that the players themselves suggested the concept of re-emphasizing the team captains.”
This story was originally published January 18, 2025 at 9:40 AM.
