There’s deeper meaning in KC Chiefs safety Tyrann Mathieu’s man of the year nomination

Not long after the Chiefs signed the linchpin of their extreme defensive makeover in 2019, new defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo recalled what a friend who had worked with Tyrann Mathieu had told him: “He changed the building the minute he walked through the door.”

That was validated and accentuated and punctuated many times over on the Chiefs’ journey to their first Super Bowl triumph in 50 years.

But Mathieu’s impact was far deeper and wider than what we witnessed in his sterling play on the field. It was, and continues to be, delivered in infinite ways that reflected the sincerity of his words one day when I had a one-on-one chat with him by his locker.

“Being a great teammate,” he said, “it might be better than being the best player on the team.”

Coming from a man who quite arguably is the second-best, or at least second-most influential, player on the team behind Patrick Mahomes, that mindset has particular sway.

Maybe you know the incredible power of that example first-hand if you’re lucky enough to have experienced it through people in your own life. If not, though, the Chiefs offered plenty of testimony from the start that resonates to this day.

Cornerback Charvarius Ward couldn’t say enough about how Mathieu both encouraged and critiqued him, about how “everything lights up” when he enters a room and what it meant in terms of camaraderie and chemistry to go to his house with teammates every Thursday night.

Diagonally across the locker room, then-Chiefs receiver Sammy Watkins marveled at how Mathieu “affects everyone around him. … It’s just something he’s been called to do. I can feel his energy everywhere.”

Everywhere, it turns out, extends quite beyond the confines of Arrowhead Stadium or the locker room at the practice facility.

Because as much as Mathieu can be appreciated for being all over the field, the three-time All-Pro who was named to the Pro Football Hall of Fame’s All-Decade Team for the 2010s, he has a parallel persona and range off the field that connect at their core.

And for his exhaustive community service and charitable work, a notion that had him meeting with then-Mayor Sly James about how he could help before he even had played a game here, Mathieu on Tuesday was named the Chiefs’ nominee for the NFL’s Walter Payton Man of the Year award.

One player from each of the 32 teams is nominated for the award, which the NFL calls its “most prestigious honor.” If Mathieu is named the winner on the Thursday before Super Bowl LVI, he’ll become the sixth Chief to be thus recognized after Willie Lanier, Len Dawson, Derrick Thomas, Will Shields and Brian Waters.

But he doesn’t need that title, or even this nomination, to confirm his emphatic impact. Virtue is its own reward, after all.

“Obviously you don’t do those things for recognition,” Mathieu said Wednesday as the Chiefs (8-4) prepared to play the Las Vegas Raiders (6-6) on Sunday at Arrowhead Stadium. “You just do them because it’s in your heart to do it, and you feel like that’s the right thing to do.”

In his case, this way of looking at things has been harnessed and actualized with the help of past NFL teammates such as Larry Fitzgerald, Patrick Peterson and Calais Campbell in Arizona.

But the seeds were planted long ago amid the tumultuous circumstances of his upbringing in New Orleans, where he experienced endless loss but also saw it as what he has called “a place where a lot of people put their arms around me.”

“I think for the most part I’m self-motivated, I can get myself going,” he said, citing his grandmother, high school and former teammates when he added, “But when I sit down and I really reflect on my life, I think I’m here because other people decided to really invest in me, to help me and spend that quality time with me.”

So he tries his best to have a good answer when defensive backs coach Dave Merritt says, “What are you doing to pay it back?”

By never forgetting from where he came and the road that it took to get here, he’s made himself unforgettable by the way he applies what he does on the field to what he can do off it.

When he said in 2019 that he was “in the business of building people up,” he was speaking specifically about the team. But it might as well have been a mission statement for his life.

The Honey Badger, it turns out, does care. About everything he does. Sometimes more than may be healthy for him.

So maybe it was no wonder early-season criticism of the team tweaked a nerve with Mathieu, who wrote on Instagram that Chiefs fans “might be one of the most toxic fan bases in all of sports.”

A day later, he asked the Chiefs to be part of a Zoom interview to take ownership of what he called a mistake while adding some meaningful context.

“Obviously we don’t want to lose, but I’ve got to do a better job of dealing with the negativity,” he said then. “This game means a lot to me. My teammates mean a lot to me. So from time to time, certain things (and) certain comments can get under my skin.

“Not just me personally, but with my teammates, as well. I always feel like I have to come to the defense of somebody, whether it’s me or my teammates. I do think there’s a time and a place for everything, so that’s one of the areas I could see myself growing in as I get older in this league.”

But back to the most substantial point here.

“He truly cares about people; I think that’s the biggest thing,” Mahomes said. “I mean, he came up in a rougher part, so he understands how much the impact of people can be to bring out greatness in everyone.

“So for him to be able to be in this locker room, be such a leader, it sets an example for everybody on how you should act on and off the field.”

Including, noted coach Andy Reid, his willingness to not just put his money behind causes but also his willingness “to give up time” to them.

“Big heart,” Reid said. “Great person.”

So the guy Reid says “mother-hens everybody out there to make sure they’re doing the right things” also is relentless in his other pursuits. Enough so that the works actually are too extensive to fit in this space. But here’s a glimpse:

As the Chiefs summarized it in their news release, “from distribution of school supplies at the start of the school year to taking underserved youth on a shopping spree as the fall unfolds to doling out turkeys leading into Thanksgiving to providing a special surprise dinner and gifting experience for families leading into the holidays, Mathieu and his Foundation annually are making a mark in his adopted Midwestern home.”

The investment in the community has gone on and on, including donating 30,000 meals to Harvesters shortly after the pandemic hit and teaming with the KC Election Board, Rock the Vote and Harvesters to host a voter registration and food distribution event and, along with Mahomes, publicly supporting the Black Lives Matter in a video that had enormous impact.

To say nothing of such efforts over the years as shutting himself in a freezer for 20 minutes to raise awareness of the agony of dogs left outside in the cold during the winter months.

In the video made for PETA, a sequel to the one he did in a car to bring attention to opposite hazards in Arizona, Mathieu could be seen shivering, trying to drink water that had turned to ice and bite into a candy bar that is too frozen to eat.

“All my body (wants) to do is huddle right now,” he said in the video.

Meanwhile, we should all be glad to have him in our huddle here.

And we should all hope for the sake of the community, and the Chiefs, that he gets a much-deserved long-term contract here after this one expires at the end of the season.

Kansas City, after all, “just feels like home,” he said.

And a better one for all of us with him here.