Kansas City Chiefs HC Andy Reid spoke to the media about the team’s newest offensive weapon for the first time on Monday.
The Chiefs traded to acquire WR Kadarius Toney from the New York Giants during the bye week. Reid commented on his health and early expectations now that Toney is officially part of the team.
“I think that’s a nice addition by Brett (Veach),” Reid began. “He is healthy right now, which is a good thing. We’re looking forward to getting him in the mix somehow. We’re working through that. We’re meeting as an offensive staff and going through those things now. We’ll just see how it sorts out here. We’ve got one football and we’ve got a few guys that we’d like to get the ball to. We’ll just see how he fits in.”
While Reid confirmed that Toney is healthy from the hamstring injury that sidelined him in New York, he tempered expectations a little bit heading into the Week 9 tilt with the Tennessee Titans. Remember, the team won’t have their first practice of the week until Wednesday. It’s hard to commit to much when you haven’t even seen a player practice for the first time.
“I’m not expecting him to learn the whole offense in a day,” Reid said. “I think it’ll be a gradual process going forward even though he is a smart kid. I’m sure he’ll pick it up relatively fast.”
As for whether the team would ease him into things by using him in the return game on special teams, Reid also cautioned about expectations there. While Toney had clear success in the return game at the University of Florida, he hasn’t done much of it during his time in the NFL.
“Yeah, again, he’s had experience with (kick and punt returns) in college,” Reid said. “He was actually very good at that in college. Not as much in the NFL as college, but we know he has that potential and we’ll just see where that goes.”
In terms of the future implications of trading for Toney, Reid leaves that handiwork to the front office. He’s filled in on the decisions, but his main focus is finding a way to get Toney worked into the offense, both in the immediate future and in the years he’ll be under contract moving forward.
“I mean on those, you’ve got to look at, we’re always trying to stay 2-3 years down the road on that part,” Reid explained. “Our financial guys do a great job with it, our cap guys and likewise (Brett) Veach does a great job with it. So, they share that with me. It’s my responsibility to get these guys incorporated. That’s kind of where my energy goes. They do have a plan there and they do talk to me about that.”
Reid is very much taking the wait-and-see approach with Toney until they get him in the meeting room and on the practice field. He did emphasize that they’ll try to highlight his strengths and build up his weaknesses moving forward.
“Yeah, so listen, we’ve got a handful of guys that are very capable,” Reid said. “And I joked about it, but you’ve got one football and you can only spread it around to one person at a time. But at the same time, we try to exploit everybody’s strengths and use them as we go and then work on whatever weaknesses they have. So that allows us to get guys into a decent position to do what we think they do best. So, it won’t be any different for him than the other guys. We’ll see how it works out. We’ll see how fast he picks it up. Then, he hasn’t played in the last couple of weeks here, so getting him back in the swing of things and the speed of things. We’ll just see, take it day by day and see how he does with it. We’re not going to rush him into something that he’s not comfortable with or that I’m not comfortable with.”
