Kansas City Chiefs coach Andy Reid spent a recent night in New York City surrounded by fans of the Jets, Giants and Patriots and by Catholic priests, Jewish rabbis, evangelical pastors and Latter-day Saint elders.
If you think the witty Reid had jokes, well, you’d be right.
But it was emotions that choked up Reid when he talked about former star quarterback Michael Vick and the need to give people second chances, and the revelation that the Chiefs’ formula for success is rooted in principles he developed from the teachings of Jesus Christ, that most moved an interfaith banquet crowd at the landmark Riverside Church on Manhattan’s Upper West Side.
During a fundraising dinner sponsored by the New York Latter-day Saint Professional Association, Reid’s rollicking 20-minute speech skidded to a brief halt when he fought back tears as he began to share the story of giving Vick another shot at the NFL.
Members of the audience in the church’s South Hall called out support for Reid as he struggled to continue, and others began to applaud in solidarity with a coach who has won three Super Bowls.
“I’m a big baby,” he said. The joke got him back on track, and he spoke passionately about Vick and Christian principles.
The fall
The Chiefs have won the past two Super Bowls, becoming the eighth NFL franchise to win back-to-back championships. Reid is energized by the fact that Kansas City has the opportunity this coming season to be the first team to win three Super Bowls in a row.
Part of their success, Reid said, is the four-part slogan plastered on walls and pillars in the team’s building. He said the players have dubbed it “The Formula.” They don’t need to know its origin story for it to inspire them, but the coach shared it with the religious leaders.
Reid said he developed “The Formula” when he saw Vick struggling in his return to the NFL after serving a prison sentence. Vick had been the first Black quarterback to be No. 1 in the draft and the first quarterback to run for 1,000 yards in the NFL. He had been to three Pro Bowls in his first six years.
“This guy was the greatest player in the National Football League at one time,” Reid said. “He was the leader of the pack. The hugest Nike contract ever went to Michael Vick. He was a hip-hop star. He was it and he was the guy.”
Then Vick, who was playing for the Atlanta Falcons, was charged and convicted and sent to prison for 21 months for his part in sponsoring dog fights. While he served his sentence, his grandmother died. He also filed for bankruptcy.
He emerged broken, according to a Washington Post feature. This electric superstar appeared forgotten and ignored, according to a GQ feature.
“It was all self-inflicted,” Vick told the Post. “I was young. I didn’t have (any) guidance. I don’t use this as no excuse. I could’ve said, ‘No.’ I could’ve made those right decisions, like, ‘This ain’t for me.’ That’s a blemish that I will never be able to erase.”
He didn’t know if he’d ever play again.
The second chance
Enter Reid, then the head coach of the Philadelphia Eagles.
“When he comes out (of prison),” Reid said, “he’s 20 pounds heavier, his family’s abandoned him — other than his wife, his family has abandoned him. All the people that were involved in the situation he had, abandoned him. (None of them) came to visit him when he was in jail. So now he comes out, and he’s wondering, ‘Am I ever gonna get back into the National Football League?’”
Reid said he did his homework on Vick and decided he deserved a second chance as a backup.
“When I met Andy,” Vick told the New York Post, “I didn’t have anything. I won’t say anything, I just had my family. I had my family and a sense of hope that I can do it all over again, and I only told two people this post-incarceration — I told two people that I just needed another opportunity, a second chance. I told my wife and I told Andy. When he brought me in I told him I just needed one shot at it. And he gave me that shot.”
Vick initially was the backup’s backup. He spent a full year as the Eagles’ third-string quarterback.
“There probably wasn’t a professional quarterback farther from glory in all of football,” the GQ feature said.
Reid clearly explained his expectations, which included Vick being a leader in the locker room. Vick told the Post that Reid spoke with the quarterback every week and asked him to check in with the coach regularly. Reid knew what was happening in his life, including who the lawyers were in his bankruptcy case.
Reid wanted to guide him in the right direction, Vick told the Post.
“He instantly made me one of the guys, and it made me comfortable,” Vick said. “He believes in people, and he gives you opportunity regardless of where you come from, what you look like. He’s always been that way. He’s just a guy who was always open, always candid, cared about us as players, cared about us as men. And as long as you give him the proper respect, he’ll give you the respect you deserve and that’s all you can ask for in a man. Fell in love with him the first time I met him.”
‘The Formula’
Reid also made Vick laugh, and helped him be comfortable on the team. He also sent him into 12 games in that first season, 2009, even though Vick never threw more than three passes while playing at the end of decided games.
Then, before the 2010 season, the Eagles traded McNabb, elevating Kolb to starter and Vick to backup. Then Kolb got hurt in the first game. Suddenly, Vick was thrust back into the spotlight.
“He’s scared to death. He’s shaking to play in the game that he once controlled,” Reid said. “So we get through the game, and he did OK. I mean, he did OK. I sat down with him and I thought, what can I give this kid? I’m giving him a chance to play, but what can I give him to help him play?”
Reid told the roomful of government and religious leaders at the New York banquet he was doing the same thing they do when they care for the needy.
“What you guys are doing, you’re giving people an opportunity,” the coach said. “So how do I give him something to help him become the player that he once was?”
Reid said he thought about what Christ’s primary characteristics would be if he were a football player and came up with “The Formula”:
- Eliminate distractions
- Create energy
- Fear nothing
- Attack everything
“Eliminate distractions, nobody did it better than Christ,” Reid said. “Nobody did that better than Christ. And then create energy. Listen to me, and we all go here: Am I going to be an energy giver or an energy taker? I presume most of the people in this room are energy givers, man. You’re going where other people are afraid to go, and you’re bringing it every day to this community here. So am I gonna be an energy giver or an energy taker?
“And then, fear nothing. Well, we all have fears. You know, we all have fears, but are you gonna run from your fear, or are you going to attack your fear? Are you going to get to the bottom of what that fear is? Are you willing to go there and go in there deep? Are you willing to go there?
“And then, attack that son of a gun, so attack everything.”
The results
Vick attacked his opportunity. The Eagles won their next two games and a few weeks later, Vick threw four touchdown passes and ran for two touchdowns in a stunning Monday Night Football performance. The GQ writer said the speedy quarterback “generally made everyone else on the field look like cats darting after a laser pointer.”
Reid and Vick were made for each other. Reid said Vick was brilliant with an incredible memory for detail. Vick said Reid’s offensive play calling was genius.
“I used to be so excited on Tuesday night when my game plan used to be faxed to the house,” Vick said. “And just looking at it, I know what he was thinking, I know why this play is here. … I could look at the game plan and see three touchdowns.”
Vick won the AP Comeback Player of the Year award, threw a career-high number of touchdown passes, finished second in the voting for the AP Offensive Player of the Year award, made the Pro Bowl again and led the Eagles to the playoffs.
“He ended up having a tremendous, rejuvenated career as he went forward,” Reid said.
Vick told the New York Post last year that he enjoys watching Reid pour the same love and care into the Chiefs as he did Vick back when they were with the Eagles.
“Coach pours into the people that’s around him, he pours into Patrick, he pours into (Travis) Kelce, he pours into every single man on that roster, every single person in that building,” Vick said. “He leans on them for support just like they lean on him. He’s in the Super Bowl, and so he’s pouring into his kids on the field, and his players, they belong to him. You ask him that, he’ll tell you — ‘These are my guys.’ He’s not just a coach. He’s a coach in life. In sports and life. And we can’t ask for too much more than that.”
Football and faith
The Chiefs continue to live by “The Formula” that Reid created to help Vick.
“Eric Berry going through training camp repeats these things,” Reid said at the banquet. “Alex Smith, who almost has his leg amputated, repeats these things back to me. You know, I tried to talk him into retirement. He wanted to come back after having this devastating knee injury, and what does he say? He goes, ‘Hey, coach, fear nothing and attack everything.’ I go, ‘All right.’”
The coach said he is cautious about how he uses his faith around the team beyond supporting pregame and postgame prayers.
“I try to tell our players that money, religion and women cause conflict on teams at times if you’re forcing things on people,” he said. “If you’re asked, no problem, but let’s not force it on each other. Let’s stay strong and respectful. So I didn’t want to come out and talk about what I felt Christ’s primary characteristics were. So I came up with those four things.”
It’s not the first time Reid has used his faith to help lead one of his teams. After the Sept. 11 attacks in 2001, he spoke to his Eagles team about grief and love.
“It was powerful,” former Eagles tight end Chad Lewis said when he recalled the moment in a 2014 BYU devotional address. “The next day (Reid) pulled me aside and mentioned how much he enjoyed watching me and my teammates quote (the late Latter-day Saint apostle) Bruce R. McConkie on the news when we didn’t even know it. I asked him what he was talking about.”
Reid told him he had found an old talk by Elder McConkie from one of the church’s general conferences.
“Yeah, grief and love,” he told Lewis. “I found an old conference report and plagiarized the whole thing!”
Reid told the Deseret News in an interview before the banquet that he encourages players and coaches to engage in charity work side by side because it creates unity among a diverse group of players from all walks of life and religious backgrounds.
“It’s a little bit like when they ask you to run wind sprints,” Reid said. “You hate it in the minute, but you love it when you’re done and you feel pretty good about yourself. So sometimes that happens with charity work: You’re a little leery going out, but once you do it, man, it feels great.”