Kansas City Chiefs wide receiver DeAndre Hopkins paid a touching tribute to his late father with a long mink coat for his entrance to Super Bowl 59.
The star receiver has been a huge piece of the Chiefs run to a third consecutive title game after he was acquired from the Tennessee Titans in an October trade.
He arrived to the game wearing a mink coat that belonged to his father, who died in a car accident in 1992 when Hopkins was just five months old.
‘My dad was [a] leader of the family, leader of our community,’ Hopkins said of Harris Steve Hopkins earlier this week.
‘So it means a lot just being able to have a little bit of him with me.’
According to ESPN, he’d promised himself he would wear the jacket on either his wedding day or his first appearance in the Super Bowl, whichever came first.
‘Obviously I’m not married. I’m going to wear my daddy’s mink jacket,’ Hopkins said at Super Bowl Opening Night.
Hopkins told Fox4KC that he had to ‘get it seamed and worked on a little bit’ to have it ready for gameday.
Kansas City Chiefs wide receiver DeAndre Hopkins paid a touching tribute to his late father with his outfit for his entrance to Super Bowl 59
The star receiver has been a huge piece of the Chiefs run to a third consecutive title game after he was acquired from the Tennessee Titans in an October trade
The receiver often honors his mother, Sabrina Greenlee, by giving her a football whenever he scores a touchdown.
Kansas City traded for DeAndre Hopkins midway through the season, back when the two-time defending Super Bowl champs had lost wide receivers Marquise Brown and Rashee Rice to injuries, and the hope was that the three-time All-Pro could help to stabilize a position group that had struggled for years.
They could only have hoped for what would transpire over the next three months.
Along with giving Patrick Mahomes a capable pass catcher, Hopkins – and Brown – began to share their knowledge with Xavier Worthy, and the result has been a massive step forward for the first-round pick headed into the postseason.
‘I’m understanding the game more, being around guys who have done it against good opponents,’ Worthy said this week, as the Chiefs prepared to play Houston in the divisional round Saturday at Arrowhead Stadium.
‘Understanding their knowledge on how to do it has helped me to evolve,’ Worthy said.
Over his first nine games, Worthy caught just 20 passes for 246 yards and three scores.
In his next seven games, which roughly coincides with the arrival of Hopkins in Kansas City, the fastest wide receiver ever to clock a 40-yard dash time at the NFL scouting combine has caught 39 passes for 392 yards and three more touchdowns.
He arrived to the game wearing a mink coat that belonged to his father, who died in 1992 when Hopkins was just five months old
The receiver often honors his mother, Sabrina Greenlee, by giving her a football whenever he scores a touchdown
‘D-Hop is really route-savvy. Played in the league for a long time,’ Worthy said.
‘Hollywood Brown, a guy kind of similar to me, helping me to learn to run routes against bigger guys. They kind of gave me some techniques to use.’
What techniques, exactly?
‘I can’t really tell you or you’ll know my tricks,’ Worthy said with a smile.
More importantly, the Texans and the rest of the NFL would know them.
It’s important to note that Hopkins and Worthy are on one-year contracts. They had no obligation to help the Chiefs beyond this season, and could instead have gone about their own business.
But both are trying to earn their first Super Bowl rings, too, and by pouring into Worthy, they have better equipped Kansas City to make another deep postseason run.
