KANSAS CITY, Mo. — For years and years now, Dustin Colquitt’s stall was the first you’d see when you entered the locker room at the Chiefs training facility at Arrowhead Stadium.
That always seemed about right when it came to not just their longest-tenured player but also an essential part of the connective tissue of the living, breathing organism within the room — a microcosm of the impact he has had on the broader Kansas City community with his charitable work.
“A great mentor,” quarterback Patrick Mahomes said last fall, adding that Colquitt embodies doing things the right way and “has a tip for everything.”
Not to mention the ability to cast his influence everywhere.
In one moment among teammates, he might have been wielding a boombox to blast the fight song of an interviewee’s alma mater.
In another, he might have been engaged with about anyone in conversations playful or thought-provoking or anywhere in between. Or just making people laugh or extolling a point of his Christian faith or simply being a great listener.
His loving friendship was profound to long snapper James Winchester after Winchester’s father, James, was murdered in 2016. And it speaks volumes that Colquitt once in particular held a seat on a plane flight for volatile former Chiefs defensive back Marcus Peters, whose on-field antics and protest stance Colquitt differed with.
Not to diminish what a terrific punter the two-time Pro Bowl performer was for the Chiefs, who after 15 seasons cut him on Tuesday.
The move apparently was made to provide further salary cap relief ($2 million) as the Chiefs evidently continue to try to position themselves to make a whopping long-term deal with Mahomes and, less certainly, defensive tackle Chris Jones.
But missed most will be his rock-solid constancy amid teammates and as a community pillar, not to mention his grace, wit, candor and accessibility with the media.
He was there for the jokes, like when my man Sam Mellinger coaxed him into critiquing Peters’ form in punting the ball into the stands. He stood up in the hard times, like after the special teams breakdowns at the end of the regular-season game at Tennessee last season.
And he would often take us where we wouldn’t get to otherwise go as we sought to provide that service to our audience. Sam has joked that he deserved a second byline on some of the things we wrote, and that sure rang true. The most recent example I can think of was just in January:
When the Chiefs were about to start the playoffs a year after falling just short of the Super Bowl, I asked Colquitt if he felt any sense of parallel with the Royals’ 2015 run after reaching Game 7 of the World Series in 2014.
Yes, it turned out, he did. And he launched into a tale about former Royals manager Ned Yost pulling Mahomes, Travis Kelce and him aside the summer before that became the basis for calling Yost and a column about the topic.
That way of treating all reflects how he embraced a role to make the most of his gifts.
