Patrick Mahomes Compares Travis Kelce to Daughter Sterling While Explaining Chiefs TE’s Lateral Play

The Week 5 clash between the Chiefs and the Saints witnessed Travis Kelce ball out. The TE, in an unexpected manner, aided his team in securing extra yardage before halftime by tossing an underhand lateral pass to Samaje Perine.

While the savvy trick play got everyone in the NFL talking, even the Chiefs QB could not stop from commenting on Travis’ play in the post-match conference. Mahomes remarked about giving Kelce a completely different instruction, recalling the short pass to be an unexpected scene.

“I mean, I’m shaking my head because I told him before the play ‘I’ll throw it to you so you can get in field goal range.’ And he underhand shoveled it across the entire field. It’s like I’m talking to Sterling. That’s Travis, man. He’s a special player.”

Mahomes humorously suggested that Travis is like a toddler, who sometimes chooses to ignore instructions and play his own way. Luckily for the Chiefs, Travis’s remarkable football IQ means that his unexpected plays end up working out for them most of the time.

This time, it was on a third-and-22 play when Mahomes handed a short pass to his TE, who instead of running with the ball drew out a different plan. Kelce ran slightly across the field, avoiding various defenders of the opposition, and then threw a brilliantly timed underhand lateral to Perine.

The Chiefs were able to gain 15 yards from the play and got the chance to convert the next play into a field goal. While the pass astonished all viewers, this is not the first time the Kansas City tight end experimented with this move.

Last year, during the game against the Bills, Kelce had managed an overhanded throw to Kadarius Toney. The Chiefs, however, did not manage to get a go-ahead touchdown out of the play as an offside penalty of lining up in the neural zone was called against Toney.

The last year’s context of the play clarifies that this was not an impromptu move from Kelce. And Coach Reid also shed some light on the same.

Coach Reid provides clarity on Kelce’s lateral play

Much like everyone else in the league, ESPN broadcaster Troy Aikman believed the Kelce lateral to be an undesigned play rather than a planned strategy.

However, the Chiefs head coach, Andy Reid, had different information to share. Reid confirmed that the play, if not a designed call, was something they definitely have worked on in practice:

“We do it every day in practice, I can’t tell you the name of it”

The words from Reid convey a planned strategy, hinting toward the KC team’s continuous strive to draw out unique plays. The next game of the Chiefs against the 49ers on October 20th will have all eyes hooked on Kelce, hoping to catch another glimpse of the unnamed play.