Why the KC Chiefs’ reunion with Kareem Hunt is uncomfortable, if not confusing

Kareem Hunt is moving from unemployment to an NFL spotlight, and the irony in the stark, abrupt contrast is that the team supplying that contrast sent him in the inverse direction six years ago.

Well, irony is one word for it.

Discomfort.

Confusion.

Hunt is back with the Chiefs on what will initially be a practice squad contract, sources told The Star, though the plan is to get him prepared for the active roster sooner rather than later. He will be in a Chiefs uniform.

Again.

The marriage comes six years after the Chiefs divorced him in November 2018, a publicly embarrassing downfall precipitated by a video showing Hunt shoving and kicking a woman in a hotel hallway.

To be clear, his return does not mean he escaped punishment altogether. Hunt is without three Super Bowl rings. He is without the honor of being part of one of the best eras in salary-capped football history. He once told a police officer during a traffic stop, “It hurts my soul.” And for all he is without, he is forever with that feeling, if not forever with that reputation.

Because that video is forever.

This week’s reunion, though, is a reminder of the actual reason for his release — it wasn’t directly the contents of that video. Hunt lied about the incident and, in turn, made the Chiefs look like fools for their slap-on-the-wrist response.

The Chiefs essentially portrayed themselves as victims of the circumstances. They were lied to. They were embarrassed. The actual victim — while acknowledging we don’t know what preceded the camera footage — was a 19-year-old woman shoved and kicked by a man strong enough to run through 300-pound men and get paid to do it.

The Chiefs ran Hunt out of town because of what he did to them.

Clear then.

Clearer now.

So you can see why I landed here: Discomfort.

Now for the other word: Confusion.

What was in 2018 too much weight for this organization to bear has now been outweighed by what they believe a 29-year-old running back can still provide.

For all of those involved in the decision to release him six years ago, and owner Clark Hunt said, “everyone was on board” with it, those same parties are responsible for determining whether he has changed as a man. Only a select few truly know.

But as a player? Uh, yeah, he’s changed.

The player booted from the facility in 2018 is not the same one walking through those doors in September 2024 hoping to fill a void left by running back Isiah Pacheco, who will miss a significant amount of time after requiring surgery this week.

The back-of-the-trading-card stat line reveals Hunt’s steadily diminishing numbers since he looked like one of the league’s best all-around running backs in Chiefs red in 2017 and 2018.

The underlying analytics? Not great, either.

Actually, that’s being too kind. By more than one metric, Hunt performed as poorly as any running back in the NFL last season.

The NFL’s Next Gen Stats catalog analyzes the expected outcome for every rushing play in a stat it terms Rushing Yards Over Expectation. Or, in Hunt’s case, yards under expectation.

A year ago, his fifth with the Cleveland Browns, Hunt averaged negative-0.8 yards over expectation per carry. That was the worst grade among 48 players who had enough rushing attempts to qualify for the stat.

The Browns did not have good quarterback play in 2023. The ESPN offensive line grades did not shed favorable light on their run blocking. The Browns utilized Hunt most in tough short-yardage situations, which didn’t help his 3.0 yards per carry.

But digging into the deeper numbers shows the party most responsible for that 3.0:

Hunt.

Barring some sort of injury excuse, Hunt appears to have lost the burst he once had. Consider it this way: In 2018, his last year in Kansas City, Hunt carried the ball 181 times, and on 31 of those rushes, he reached a peak speed of at least 15 miles per hour. That’s 17.1% of his handoffs.

Last year in Cleveland, you know how many times he reached 15 miles per hour on a carry?

Four. All season. On 135 carries. That’s a paltry 3%.

If you’re shouting right now that speed was never Hunt’s strength, I’ll nod along. But if the hope is that he can provide the physicality that the Chiefs lose with Pacheco’s injury, well, that didn’t happen last season, either. Among the 55 running backs who carried the ball at least 80 times, Hunt forced the fewest missed tackles in the game, with just nine, per PFF. He averaged just 2.15 yards after contact, which also ranked last in the league.

It’s not a great resume. And it’s been trending in this direction for a couple of seasons. The Chiefs saw something in Hunt’s workout Tuesday that he didn’t show in games in 2023, even if he showed it so consistently in Kansas City for two seasons.

They kicked Hunt out of football, albeit temporarily, six years ago because of an incident caught on tape. He was out of football through training camp this year because of what the football tape showed.

It’s a confusing combination to prompt a return, even as I have to recognize it comes with a low financial cost on a team in need of some backfield help. This is about curving the expectations for that cost.

There is a is-the-juice-worth-the-squeeze question on all NFL players with complicated backgrounds. That’s not exclusive to Kareem Hunt, nor is it exclusive to the Chiefs, nor in many other aspects of life.

But there is an amendment to the Hunt question:

How much juice does he even have left?