Chiefs detail White House visit, turn page to new title quest

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (KCTV) - Kansas City Chiefs players and coaches made their way to the White House earlier this week to celebrate their recent Super Bowl win.

Second-year Chiefs safety Justin Reid was amazed by the history, while head coach Andy Reid marveled at the food.

“Man, the White House was sick,” Justin Reid said. “I didn’t know what to expect when we went out there but it was a good time. I’m an information junkie.”

It was the first White House trip in the franchise history for Kansas City. Members of the 2019 Chiefs team never made it to the White House after the COVID-19 pandemic shut down the nation shortly after they defeated the San Francisco 49ers in Super Bowl 54.

On Thursday, as the Chiefs continue wrapping up the final week of off-season OTAs, the Stanford product recalled a story provided by a White House staffer about a pricy painting that hung on the wall.

“One of the art curators said 60 or 70 years ago this American family took a trip to India and they saw a portrait covered in dirt, muddy, whatever,” Justin said. “They end up going to the store and the people sold it for $7. They get the portrait and bring it back to America. Turns out it was like an original painting of Philadelphia from colonial time and the portrait is worth $300 million.

“They bought it for $7 and it’s worth $300 million. That’s nuts.”

READ MORE: Chiefs celebrate Super Bowl win at White House

The Chiefs’ head coach has spoken previously about his love for hamburgers, but Thursday discussed in-depth his amazement with the food spread in Washington, DC.

“They did have some good stuff. I’ve never had this before -- a French toast, grilled cheese and ham sandwich that they sprinkled a little bit of powdered sugar on. I mean, it was phenomenal,” the two-time Super Bowl champion head coach said, describing the food with as much or more detail as any football play. “There was an abundance of this and then they had exotic chicken fingers.

“And maybe the best part was that they had these bite-sized squares of the heart of the watermelon. My hat went off to the chef. I went back and talked to him. I just go, ‘you guys are unbelievable.’”

On his latest New Heights podcast episode, Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce shared what he planned to say before quarterback Patrick Mahomes quickly pulled him away from the presidential platform.

“The President at the podium, it’s iconic, right?” Kelce said. “He usually addresses the Americans with “my fellow Americans,” and that’s all I wanted to say. That’s it.”

Overall, Andy Reid said the trip remained special regardless of what party anyone on the team was a part of.

“What was neat, you put all the politics aside,” Andy Reid said. “So you’re not a Democrat, you’re not a Republican, you’re not Independent. You’re just an American and I thought that was the neatest part of the thing. Everybody was just enjoying the history.”

Now that the team is back in Kansas City, Andy Reid said the OTA program went through preparation for the AFC West this week and will go through plans related to their season-opener against the Detroit Lions on Friday.

“Honestly, the page is already turned,” Justin Reid said. “We’re out there working; we’re out there chasing another championship. We’re starting to build a new culture. Every year is different, it’s a new team. We know nothing is going to be given to us, we’ve got an even bigger target on our back than we did last year. We get to take a moment every once in a while, to go back in the history book – or the yearbook – and enjoy that moment and have some of our former players like Juan (Thornhill) and JuJu (Smith-Schuster) and some of those guys come back, you get to talk to them a little bit.

“But as far as the mentality in the room, we’re working to continue this dynasty and continue to build on what we did last year, not just rest on our laurels of what we did.”

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