The Chiefs will have their head coach around for at least one more season, but they do need to find a new backup quarterback. Chad Henne announced (via Instagram) in the aftermath of Kansas City’s Super Bowl victory that he is retiring. 
The 37-year-old spent the first nine years of his career in Florida. A second-round pick of the Dolphins in 2008, he started 31 of his 36 appearances in Miami before being replaced by Ryan Tannehill. That led Henne to Jacksonville, where he held the starting role for a pair of seasons prior to the arrival of Blake Bortles. Overall, he finished his career with an 18-36 record as a starter.
For the past four seasons, Henne backed up Patrick Mahomes in Kansas City. He made just one start over that stretch, and 11 total appearances. His limited action with the Chiefs was enough to earn him a new one-year, $2MM deal this past offseason. Rather than attempting to land a new contract in Kansas City or elsewhere, the Michigan product will hang up his cleats with a pair of Super Bowl rings.
Henne was called into action during the Chiefs’ divisional round game against the Jaguars this postseason, after Mahomes suffered a high ankle sprain. That injury was a key talking point throughout the remainder of the team’s playoff run, and forced Henne to briefly come into the game. It seemed as though that scenario could be repeated again last night, after Mahomes re-injured his ankle at the end of the first half. Instead, Henne remained on the sidelines for the Chiefs’ comeback victory.
Henne ends his career with modest totals from a statistical standpoint (13,290 passing yards, 60 touchdowns, 63 interceptions) but his Chiefs tenure allowed him to take part in a pair of championship runs. His total earnings add up to nearly $40MM after 13 years in the NFL. Kansas City has former UDFA Shane Buechele and 2022 seventh-rounder Chris Oladokun available as in-house replacement options.
Pretty crappy career he had. I’m sure this isn’t what he had in mind coming out of college. The stats are ugly!
Anyways, congrats to him on being able to linger around so long and getting a ring on his way out.
40 million over 13 years…2 rings. I would say pretty good career.
I would as well. And being 2nd string for most of it, he should be healthy as well. Next up, the coaching cycle or media.
Good when he wasn’t on the field yeah. When he was k the field he was garbage lol
I did congratulate him on being able to linger for so long. He made a ton of money and got the rings. But when he was actually on the gridiron the results were dead a** ugly.
Why can’t we be honest about that sometimes? Must we praise every single player?
The guy was a backup and his stats basically confirmed that. The whole “he sucked on the field” hot take isn’t necessary. Dude got paid and has rings. Most starters don’t even get the chance to win titles like he did.
Yeah. Absolutely terrible. The guy didn’t provide for his family and is clearly a terrible father and husband. Embarrassing that he only made it 13 years in the NFL. What a loser.
What does that have to do with the fact that he sucked at his job lol? How do you know how good a father and husband he is and what does that have to do with anything? He played like trash for 13 years, look at the stats.
Haha. Has nothing to do with praising him, I’m sure. What kind of career did you have? I’d kill to make 40 million, barely play, and have two Super Bowl rings. If that’s what a backup gets, sign me up haha. Sounds good to me. I’d consider myself lucky. Most guys don’t let a year or two.
I keep trying to look up Lyman’s NFL stats, but I’m coming up empty…
Cause he played baseball. Can’t you see his pic
The fact that you have to use a regular person to make your point that he had a great career is exactly making my point lol
Good enough to last 13 seasons. He had a preferable career to guys like Jamarcus Russell, Joey Harrington, Brady Quinn, Tim Couch, EJ Manuel, etc. Something about being able to hang on even as a clipboard holder makes me think he didn’t suck. There was a reason he wasn’t ran out of the league.
he attempted 2 passes for 0 completions this season, and made more money than Brock Purdy who destroyed his knee
I really can’t tell if you’re being sarcastic or serious, but either way you have to put it into perspective. Even just setting foot on an NFL field would be a really cool experience for us average people, and I think we all want to make a career out of something we love doing instead of something that just pays bills. $40 million helps a lot with that too.
Honestly, being a long-term backup QB has to be one of the best jobs out there. Chase Daniel is still going strong and making millions doing the same thing.
Every college prospects dream. If only I can be a backup basically my whole career and lose the vast majority of games I play while throwing more picks than INT’s.
He succeeded in that he got to the NFL and stayed in the league 13 years. When I did 7 on 7 against him I didn’t think he was all that special. But that was HS.
But compare him to like Hackenberg, both PA QBs both 2nd rounders. Or even compare him to Brian Brohm. If Chad Pennington doesn’t get injured idk that Henne has the career he had tbh. Could very well have gone ended up like Brian Brohm. So by those measures he definitely had a successful career. Clearly he was good in the QB room, otherwise he wouldn’t have latched on as a backup for 9 years.
Very predictable responses. Everyone loves to praise every single player. In the context of us regular people, yes. Great career very successful. In the scope of the NFL he was garbage. Lost a lot more games than he won, threw more picks than TD’s. What team did he make better exactly? What contribution did he make to the game? He was horrible
Teams clearly thought he was a capable player since he was rostered for over a decade. You don’t stick in the league for 13 years if you are garbage. Sure he wasn’t a starting caliber qb, so are 2/3s of the qbs in the NFL. Are they all garbage? If he was so bad, why did he last? Why did KC give him multiple contracts? Look at the laundry list of 1st round qbs that couldn’t stick around even as backups. You felt the need to denigrate this man’s career for what purpose? And then you get all sensitive when people disagree with your unnecessarily negative take
Are you suggesting that sports fans never say a guy is bad? You’re kidding right? So you as a fan only praise every player? Clearly he’s proof that you can stick in the NFL for 13 years and be trash. Especially if teams have to keep you off the field to win lol. Him with the ball in his hands equaled a loss 66% of the time.
There’s a reason Henne didn’t play a lot lol. How can you not see that? and You call me sensitive? If I was sensitive I wouldn’t have made my post because I knew in these boards everyone likes to praise a player as soon as they retire. Yet any player that’s still playing it’s cool to say they’re bad. Well I’m not with that silly group think. Henne was a second round pick. He was awful every time he was between the lines. Was he not? Do you think he was good at his job of playing NFL QB? You want him to come out of retirement and play in games for your team?
You respond to every post about a player you don’t even like. You are unrelenting in wanting your opinion to be right. You are clearly taking all of this too personally, the literal definition of being overly sensitive.
He was the starting qb for my favorite team. I have nothing bad to say about the guy even though he wasn’t the answer.
You seem like you wanna talk about me, more than Henne. I actually tried to engage in a sports debate with you and asked specific questions about Henne that you just didn’t answer. No one can even say one positive thing about his actual performance. He held a clip board nice lol? He watches film nice? He’s better than JaMarcus Russell? He has better stats than a fan who has no stats? That last one is arguable. Henne was a net negative when on the field. That seems to just be something you wanna skate around.
I acknowledged how he lingered around and got this last ring. I thought those were positives? What else positive is there to say? His stats were awful his performance was awful.
And yeah, I’m arguing with you guys but to me it’s a passionate sports argument. Anything personal or feelings being brought up is just you guys being sensitive and you can’t defend Henne with actually stats or a sports argument. You have to make it about it instead. Nah man, the dude was just a bad player lol. Nothing wrong with that. As you guys pointed out, being a bad NFL player for 13 years is still great overall compared to most people careers. So try to relax. I said Chad Henne sucks, not Tom Brady or anything. Geez
You can’t be serious. You tried to “engage in a sports debate”? When? With who? Every single one of your responses are talking down to the poster. You insult and demean because people disagree with you. It’s obvious and sad.
But let’s debate the two stats you did give in your who knows how many posts. Stat #1, he lost a lot of games. Now this should go without saying, but football is a team sport. There is more that goes into winning than just the qb. He played the majority of his career for the post Marino dolphins and the Jacksonville jaguars. Those teams were bad before he got there and long after.
Stat #2, why you chose this is beyond me…but here we go. He threw more picks than tds. He threw 3 more ints to tds. Let’s calm down, that isn’t egregious. 60 tds to 63 ints. Well, I hate to break it to you but the Hall of Fame, where the garbage players don’t get in, has like 10 QBs inducted that have thrown more picks than tds. Was Joe Namath garbage? He threw like 50 more ints than tds.
Now, the problem i have with your argument, and I think this is where most of us are coming from…when a guy is in the top 100 people in the world that do his job, it’s pretty ballsy to call them garbage. In the ENTIRE WORLD, he is in the top 100 qbs over the past decade. Compared to the top 40, yea he’s not as good. Compared to the 140th best qb in the world? He’s a stud.
Get over yourself bro
He was an objectively bad NFL qb in terms of on field play and stats. That is a fact. That’s still not something to be ashamed of. He was obviously a good team guy with some redeeming qualities we don’t know about.