The Kansas City Chiefs have a rookie draft pick in the tight end room for the first time since 2015.
The Chiefs have long sought a solid No. 2 tight end behind Travis Kelce, but to this point, they’ve struggled to find one. After five consecutive 1000-yard receiving seasons by Kelce, the team placed a renewed emphasis on finding a No. 2 tight end this season. The team traded up in the draft to select Duke TE Noah Gray in the fifth round. Typically, expectations would be low for a fifth-round draft pick, but Gray already seems to be ascending the depth chart.
On Tuesday, Kelce spoke with the Kansas City media and had a chance to provide his first impression of his new understudy. So far it sounds like Gray is ahead of where a normal rookie might be during this point of the offseason.
“One of Coach Reid’s big things is bring energy and show your personality, and so far he’s done both,” Kelce said of Gray. “It’s been a lot of fun so far. 83 (Noah Gray), he’s got a very unique way of understanding football. He’s years ahead of being a rookie, which is awesome. You can kind of give him pointers, and he’s running with everything.”
It’s been a while since Kelce was the young tight end in the room. He might not always act like it, but he’s the veteran in Kansas City now. He has some wisdom to pass onto Gray, just as former Chiefs TE Anthony Fasano passed that same wisdom onto him.
“Just the confidence of the game,” Kelce explained. “I think that’s the biggest thing that Fasano gave me, was that if you put the work in, if you understand the game mentally, you can play so much faster. I think Noah has a great understanding of the game. He has a good understanding of what defenses are being presented in front of him, and that’s half the battle, knowing what the other side of the ball is doing so you have an idea of what you should be doing. And yeah, he’s hit the ground running ever since we started.”
Gray has earned opportunities with the first-team offense opposite Kelce during OTAs and minicamp. We’ll see if that persists once the pads come on during training camp, but early indications show that Gray is carving out a role for himself in 2021.
“He’s absorbing all the information that the coaches are giving him, that he’s hearing from other players, and he’s having a lot of success out there on the field,” Kelce said of Gray. “He’s going to definitely help us this year.”
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