‘The stars aligned:’ How Andy Reid came to coach the KC Chiefs (and change everything)

As the Chiefs trudged to the end of another wretched season in 2012, a 2-14 fiasco, Andy Reid’s Philadelphia Eagles were on the way to a similarly miserable finish (4-12).

Each team’s 2012 season, alas, was also underscored by off-field devastation: For the Chiefs, it was inextricably tethered to the horrifying murder of Kasi Perkins by linebacker Jovan Belcher and his subsequent suicide; Reid’s 29-year-old son Garrett had died by an accidental heroin overdose in a dorm room at the Eagles’ Lehigh University pre-season training camp.

The woeful seasons and shattering events were independent in real time. But they would come to gravitate to each other in the uncanny way two forces in need of each other sometimes do … in ways with remarkable ripples toward Super Bowl LVII.

So as we contemplate and appreciate Reid’s decade with the Chiefs culminating with a showdown with the Eagles, let’s start with this:

For many reasons, it might well have gone otherwise after the Chiefs fired Romeo Crennel in favor of hiring their fifth coach since 2005.

Reid had a number of other suitors, particularly Arizona and the Chargers, and he certainly could have gone elsewhere. Or could have considered taking time off.

Or he may even have been able to stay in Philadelphia, if he hadn’t felt he needed a change himself.

We often hear the euphemism about teams and employees mutually agreeing to part ways. But in this case, amid family tragedy and Reid’s tenure having gone stale with restless fans as the Eagles missed the playoffs in back-to-back seasons, that’s at least in part what happened.

That scenario was “exactly right,” Chiefs chairman and CEO Clark Hunt said in a 2013 interview with The Star, adding that Reid “helped convince” owner Jeffrey Lurie that moving on would be great for the Eagles and great for Reid.

“Sometimes,” Hunt said then, “change is good.”

Sometimes even for all concerned, as it happened with this one.

“You can say the stars aligned,” Hunt said.

More than Hunt could possibly have known when he said that in 2013.

Mahomes: ‘No offense to Philly, but ...’

Since then, Reid has emerged as the fifth-winningest coach in NFL history, whisked the Chiefs to their first Super Bowl (and title) in 50 years and has forged a team led by Patrick Mahomes that figures to contend for several more.

In the wake of the Tyreek Hill trade last offseason, Reid nonetheless guided the Chiefs to a 14-3 regular-season record, a seventh straight AFC West title and to hosting a fifth straight AFC Championship Game — making him a worthy candidate for NFL coach of the year.

Along the way, Reid now is second (21) only to Bill Belichick (31) in NFL career postseason wins and the only head coach in NFL history to win 10 or more playoff games with two franchises.

That punctuates the fact that he became the first coach to win 100 or more games with two franchises when he notched his 100th Chiefs victory at Philadelphia in the 2021 season.

At the time, Mahomes reckoned Philadelphia was where Reid “kind of became Andy Reid, in a sense.”

But the broader implication was that it was in Kansas City that he became what might be called Andy Reid 2.0, a coach able to convert his identity from never quite reeling in the big one to perennial contention and a Pro Football Hall of Fame resume.

“No offense to Philly,” Mahomes said then, “but I’m glad they let him go and he’s here coaching us in Kansas City.”

That’s hardly the only way the momentous turn has implications for a game rich in subplots, including the Brothers Kelce facing each other and a deep history of Eagles-Chiefs connections.

Among the dynamics set in motion when Reid and the Eagles truly parted ways: When Hunt hired Reid, Reid decided not to retain incumbent Chiefs receivers coach Nick Sirianni because he was bringing David Culley with him from Philly for that job.

Yes, that Nick Sirianni, now the Eagles head coach, who over the years has said how grateful he’s been for Reid’s personal touch with him then. He reiterated that at his news conference Tuesday.

“I really admired that he pulled me into the office and asked to meet with me and told me face-to-face that he had a guy, but had heard good things about me,” Sirianni said. “And I appreciated that, his honesty, his ability to get to me as soon as he possibly could so I could move on and find another job.”

‘An ideal candidate’ as head coach

As much as it all seems meant to be now, the grim circumstances that were part of a parallel track initially gave Hunt some pause.

“Andy had had a terrible personal tragedy in his family life the year before, and … one of the big questions I had going into the interview was whether he was ready to take on a new challenge or whether he would have benefited from a year off,” Hunt said the week before the Chiefs beat the 49ers in Super Bowl LIV.

The more he learned about Reid through a nine-hour interview on Jan. 2, 2013, at Philadelphia International Airport, though, the more Hunt had an opposite realization.

“We were definitely looking for an experienced mature leader; that’s what the organization needed at that point,” Hunt said in that 2020 interview. “And a lot of that had to do with the challenges we’d had on the field as well as off the field the year before.

“And I think a lot of what Andy had been through from his own standpoint, both with the Eagles and then with his family, made him an ideal candidate.”

Not just ideal for the Chiefs, though, given the other franchises pursuing Reid.

In fact, while Hunt and others were interviewing Reid that day, Arizona sent a plane to Philly for Reid that he never boarded. He also canceled a scheduled interview with the Chargers.

Much of that was Hunt effectively winning the day, as a source once told then-Star columnist Sam Mellinger.

But there was another Philadelphia Story at play in the cosmic factors that paved the way to Reid’s extraordinary decade that has changed everything about how we view the Chiefs.

‘I just don’t think you can do any better’

Former Eagles and Chiefs (and Rams) coach Dick Vermeil was a vital matchmaker connected both to Hunt and Reid — whom he had called weekly when Reid was coaching in Philly.

In a letter of support for Vermeil’s induction into the Hall of Fame, Reid wrote that Vermeil had “escorted me into the challenges of being a first-time head coach in the City of Philadelphia.” That became part of how Vermeil engaged both Hunt and Reid.

Having coached in each city and grasping the differences in the terrain, Vermeil had a keen sense of both what had gone awry in Philly and why Reid could flourish in the atmosphere of Kansas City.

So he endorsed Reid to Hunt. And when Reid asked Vermeil to tell him about Kansas City, Vermeil’s first words were along the lines of “take the job.”

Then he reminded Reid of his time as a University of Missouri assistant coach (1989-91) and how that related to the fan base he’d have here.

“He’s been in middle America before and knows what the people are like,” Vermeil told then-Star reporter Randy Covitz in 2013 as Reid was deciding. “He knows how I feel about it. He’s been in that stadium. … And he knows how the fans are there …

“And he knows the great respect and admiration people in the NFL have for the Hunt family. So why not go? There are no negatives.”

Vermeil added, “He’s a great person and a great coach. I think he’ll fit in perfectly within that environment, and he’ll fit in the organization. I just don’t think you can do any better.”

Days later, they began to demonstrate just that with the introduction of Reid as the new head coach. At the news conference, Reid would say he felt a “certain energy” with Hunt and the Chiefs’ entourage that just made it feel right.

A few minutes later, Reid smiled and said, “I’ve got to find the next Len Dawson, doggone it.”

Reason to believe in the Chiefs

Even before he found that, Reid’s impact was instant with the highly capable-but-not-quite-superstar Alex Smith at quarterback.

The Chiefs won their first nine games the next season, for starters.

And you know what’s happened the last few seasons since he got his contoured version of Len Dawson in Mahomes — with whom he enjoys an almost mystical chemistry that has brought out the best in each.

Along the way, the understated Reid has become iconic among Chiefs fans who over decades of futility had become conditioned to assuming the worst.

Now, vague hope has been replaced by concrete reasons to believe … and one of the most exhilarating products in NFL history.

Not that it’s come without turbulence on the field and off-field trials.

In his first season, Reid’s Chiefs stunningly lost their playoff opener at Indianapolis 45-44 after leading 38-10.

When the 2015 team began 1-5, Reid’s Chiefs teams had lost 18 of their last 30 games before rallying to win 11 straight and the franchise’s first playoff game in decades.

In the years to come, they’d drop two more postseason games after holding 18-point leads.

And instead of pulling off an encore to their first Super Bowl victory in 50 years, they were thrashed by Tampa Bay 31-9 in Super Bowl LV.

(That defeat came days after Reid’s son, Britt, a Chiefs assistant coach, severely injured 6-year-old Ariel Young in a crash driving while intoxicated. Britt Reid pleaded guilty last fall and was sentenced to three years in prison.)

Through the ups and downs on the field, though, Reid has both remained steadfast and evolved — a creature of habit who paradoxically is ever-changing.

One way or another, he consented to the 2017 firing of general manager John Dorsey in favor of Brett Veach — with whom Reid enjoys a depth of trust forged over years of working together, a trust that has allowed Reid to let go of the control over personnel he once demanded.

After the 2018 season, Reid fired defensive coordinator Bob Sutton and brought in Steve Spagnuolo. And Mahomes will tell you “the offense was completely different” when he first got here than it is now.

Considering how Reid has adapted to modern players, as well, Veach put it this way before the season: “He’s not the same guy that he was when I interned in Philly. I mean, he is a different guy.”

In part because he’s in a different place and time. And because sometimes change is good.

Especially when it seems like the stars were aligning for it — perhaps at this moment more than ever as Reid and the Eagles face each other in a game improbably set in motion a decade ago.