Andy Reid can’t help but play into the biggest mystery surrounding the Kansas City Chiefs before the 2026 season
No one knows how good the Kansas City Chiefs will be in 2026, but if Patrick Mahomes is healthy, we all know they will compete.
No one knows how good the Kansas City Chiefs will be in 2026, but if Patrick Mahomes is healthy, we all know they will compete. That’s just the thing, though; we don’t know for sure if Mahomes will be ready for Week 1. We are hearing that, but no one truly knows.
But, head coach Andy Reid is not afraid to feed into it all.
“He’s getting better every day, he’s not taking any setbacks — it’s a day-to-day thing, maybe you have a chance to see him in the first game,” Reid said on the Rich Eisen Show.
His knee injury is a bit more complicated than the average ACL tear. Not to mention, his Week 1 start wouldn’t align with the full recovery timeline athletes usually have for an injury like his. But this is Patrick Mahomes we are talking about. We know he recovers from injuries pretty quickly—just look at his high ankle sprain.
But this recovery would be truly insane, and it’s not just a hypothetical that he plays. This could really happen in Week 1. There’s a new video of Mahomes golfing making the rounds. His swing still looks good, and he’s wearing a compression sleeve on his knee. There are probably some people who have never played golf who think this doesn’t mean anything because it’s not a physical sport. But it does. If you ask me, Mahomes plays Week 1, and Reid is just playing into the drama.
NFL wouldn’t give the Chiefs back-to-back primetime games if it didn’t think Mahomes would play
The Chiefs are starting the year on ESPN, on Monday Night Football against the Denver Broncos. Denver also has their QB, Bo Nix, out with an injury, and he could be out Week 1 as well. So, that would mean the NFL is really thinking both those guys will be available.
And, to make that point even clearer, they gave the Chiefs a primetime game the very next week, too. So they play at night in Week 1, then play at night again in Week 2, when they face the Indianapolis Colts on Sunday Night Football. They wouldn’t give that game if Mahomes wasn’t playing, either, considering Indianapolis’ QB is Daniel Jones, who is also coming back from an injury that finished his season early.