On Thursday, Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes spoke with local media for the first time since last month’s season-ending ACL tear.
The league’s biggest star confirmed reports that his rehab
is taking place exclusively in Kansas City with familiar team trainer Julie Frymyer. While he is not ready to definitively announce his return date, Mahomes is working to be ready to start the 2026 season.
He also hopes to participate in the spring’s organized-team-activities (OTAs) in some fashion while taking on a bigger workload at training camp.
“Obviously,” he said, “I think [in] the long-term, I want to be ready for Week 1. The doctor said that I could be, but I can’t predict what’s going to happen throughout the process. But that’s my goal, and so I’ll try to prepare myself to be ready to play in that Week 1 and have no restrictions. You want to be out there healthy and giving us the best chance to win. So, obviously, I’ll hopefully be able to do some stuff in OTAs and get to training camp and hopefully be able to do a lot there.”
Conflicting analysis frequently surrounds major injuries regarding when the extent of an injury is truly known. While the eyes of the sports world anxiously watched Mahomes limp into the Chiefs’ locker room on December 14, the quarterback actually held out hope of returning to finish the game.
“I knew something had happened,” he recalled. “But once I was able to walk a little bit, I thought I might have a chance to kind of get back into the game. You go into the tent, they do the test, and they want to take you back to the locker room. So you don’t know for sure and everything like that. But when I was ready to move, I asked one of the doctors if I could get a brace and just finish the game, but they wouldn’t let me.”
The reasons doctors would not simply give him a brace soon became clear.
“It kind of sunk in once the game ended,” Mahomes explained, “and then I was able to get the results from the MRI and stuff like that. It’s hard, but at the same time, you’ve got to kind of flip the script fast knowing that it’s going to be a quick turnaround to get to this season. So now, it’s just been motivating trying to push myself — as much as they’ll let me push myself — to be ready for next year.”
Being ready for next year may involve dual spring responsibilities of injury rehab and studying whatever new wrinkles the Chiefs plan to add to the offense after missing the postseason for the first time in Mahomes’ career.
Even when he isn’t getting the physical practice reps, Mahomes believes he can improve as a player.
“I think more than anything,” he remarked, “it’s just being in there and being in the room, being on the field as much as they’ll let me. And then when I’m not able to, to take the reps, kind of getting those mental reps behind the play and seeing everything develop. The coaches will put me in the right position in order to do that. I’ll take it slow — but at the same time, I’ll push to be out there as much as I can be. We have a great plan in place as far as kind of where we want to get to, but we have to let it all play out and kind of take it a day at a time — which [has] been hard for me. But at the same time, it makes me get the best out of every single day.”
An offseason spent on site with the training staff will put a temporary pause on “Camp Mahomes” — the recent trend in which the quarterback invites his receivers to spend the first part of OTAs practicing with him in the Dallas/Fort Worth area. They will likely begin the offseason program in-house under closer watch of head coach Andy Reid (and subject to more stringent rules about what activities are allowed in the initial phase).
Mahomes believes he and the group can still build the needed rapport, possibly while taking in some local baseball.
“I can’t speak for what Coach Reid exactly is going to do,” said Mahomes, “but I would expect us to kind of be here a little bit earlier just with me already being here. I’ve talked to some of the receivers already. I think that’s kind of the mindset that we have is we want to be in the building and getting back to it. The thing about when you lose and you don’t make the playoffs, you have a longer offseason than you usually have. So, I think guys are getting away right now, kind of getting their minds right, getting their bodies right — but guys are hungry to get back out there.
“It’s hard to watch these playoff games. So we’ll be in the building and you’ll try to build that camaraderie that way. It’s just doing stuff around Kansas City. Maybe [I’ll] take them to some Royals games — or whatever, wherever that is — and try to build those relationships with those guys.”
