Shortly after winning Super Bowl LVII, Kansas City Chiefs wide receiver JuJu Smith-Schuster was reflecting on what led to that point. And his teammate, Kadarius Toney, quickly came to mind.
Toney, of course, had a five-yard touchdown reception and the longest punt return in Super Bowl history during the game. He was a key factor in taking down the Philadelphia Eagles.
Buy Giants TicketsWhat Smith-Schuster couldn’t make sense of, however, was why the New York Giants decided to trade Toney. And at that moment, he took unprovoked aim at Big Blue.
“I don’t know what the Giants were doing with KT, but he’s a dog,” he told reporters. “Brett Veach and Andy Reid know how to pick and choose who to go get and who will fit in with this team. The hard part with him is trying to block for him, he’s like a rubber band. He just jukes so many times that it’s hard to block for him, but as you can see his punt return set us up big to put points on the board.”
This is a sentiment that has been expressed repeatedly since Toney found his way to Kansas City.
Toney had significantly more success with the Chiefs than he did with the Giants over his first season-plus, but it’s not hard to understand why. Despite missing some time due to various injuries this past season, Toney actually managed to play some games in Kansas City. That wasn’t the case in New York, where he was repeatedly sidelined for issues ranging from bad cleats to chronic hamstring issues.
In addition to those issues, Toney’s tenure with the Giants also featured him punching an opponent and routinely engaging in a war of words with reports and fans alike.
And it wasn’t an anomaly. Toney failed to stay healthy or produce under two separate coaching staffs and under two separate general managers. But it wasn’t for a lack of trying as head coach Brian Daboll did his best to reach Toney on a personal level, even playing his music (see: Yung Joka) at practice.
It’s great for Toney that he finally found his place but that wasn’t ever going to happen with the Giants. Some people are made for New York and some simply can’t handle it. Toney was the latter.
