Three months after Andy Reid grew to become the top coach of the Kansas Metropolis Chiefs, the crew used a sixth-round draft choose (204th total) to amass Kansas State fullback Braden Wilson within the 2013 NFL Draft.
4 days later, the crew traded fourth-year cornerback Javier Arenas — a former second-round choose who had began 9 video games for Kansas Metropolis in 2012 — to the Arizona Cardinals for fullback Anthony Sherman, who had collected 114 yards from scrimmage on 14 touches in the course of the earlier two seasons.
It’s honest to say that some observers had been puzzled. Kansas Metropolis had completed with the league’s worst file in 2012. But Reid (and new common supervisor John Dorsey) had been expending priceless belongings to seek out… a fullback?
Wilson didn’t even make it to the ultimate roster cutdown. As a substitute, Sherman made the crew. By the top of the season — during which he gained a modest 158 yards from scrimmage on 20 touches, however was named a second-team All-Professional — we understood that for Reid, a fullback was an vital cog in his offensive machine. And to particular groups coordinator Dave Toub, Sherman was an important a part of each unit.
Sherman stayed with Kansas Metropolis for eight seasons, changing into a fan favourite as a blue-collar participant generally known as “The Sausage.” After his retirement in 2020, the Chiefs acquired veteran fullback Michael Burton, who crammed the place admirably in each 2021 and 2022.
However in 2023, Kansas Metropolis went with out one. It was solely the third season of Reid’s 25-year head teaching profession during which he didn’t have at the very least one fullback on his roster.
That would change in 2024. Former UCLA operating again Carson Steele joined the crew as an undrafted free agent after the NFL Draft. At 6 ft and 228 kilos, he’s the most important operating again among the many seven on the roster. A local of Heart Grove, Indiana — a tiny unincorporated group south of Indianapolis — Steele obtained work on the place in the course of the crew’s offseason program. He’s even sporting Sherman’s outdated quantity: 42.
“Actually, I really feel actual good about all the pieces,” Steele advised Johnson County, Indiana’s Every day Journal. “They’ve obtained me rolling out and in at operating again and at fullback. So long as I’m on the market, I’m cool with no matter. I really feel like I can slot in someplace.”
The 21-year-old began his school profession at Ball State — about an hour and a half up I-69 — earlier than spending his remaining yr at UCLA. Practising with NFL stars like Patrick Mahomes and Travis Kelce felt like a dream.
“Man, it was simply superior to get that chance,” he stated of the exercises in Kansas Metropolis, “and with the ability to study from them. Every thing was going so quick. You simply needed to deal with studying the brand new performs.”
And on occasion, on an surprising throw. Throughout one session, Mahomes flipped a behind-the-back cross to the younger rookie.
“I virtually wasn’t even paying consideration,” recalled Steele, “after which he swung it behind his again. I used to be like, ‘Please don’t drop it. Please don’t drop it.’
“[Mahomes] yelled, ‘One-handed!’ He yelled it actual loud.”
As directed, Steele introduced it in together with his left hand.
Now again dwelling for the summer time break, the rookie is working with native gamers and longtime Heart Grove soccer coach Eric Moore.
“[We’re] simply giving him a spot to do all his drills [and] to elevate weights,” defined Moore. “Simply supporting him. You must keep centered. Carson is across the younger children, and he additionally has an enormous playbook to study.
“It’s simply cool that he’s sharing it with everybody. He’s the group’s child.
“I’m simply terrible pleased with him. Nobody deserves a chance to be within the NFL greater than Carson Steele.”
