D.J. Humphries Outlines Recovery from Injury, 'Interesting' Journey to Chiefs

It's been a unique past several months for D.J. Humphries, but he always had some sort of inkling he'd end up in a spot like Kansas City.

Arizona Cardinals offensive lineman D.J. Humphries (74) during organized team activities at Dignity Health Arizona Cardinals Training Center in Tempe on June 7, 2023. / Rob Schumacher/The Republic / USA TODAY NETWORK

As the Kansas City Chiefs gear up for the final stretch of the 2024-25 season, they'll be doing so with a new left tackle in the fold. D.J. Humphries is officially a member of the reigning Super Bowl champions and figures to factor into their plans to chase a record-setting third championship in a row soon.

For Kansas City, it's a chance to solidify a spot that's been anything but stable for the team throughout the year. For Humphries, this is an opportunity for him to come off a late-2023 ACL tear and get back to pursuing a ring.

What was the most difficult part of his journey since suffering a major injury and subsequently being released by the Arizona Cardinals back in March? Essentially being written off, said Humphries in his introductory press conference this week.

"Man, it's been interesting," Humphries said. "It's been, how you say, you find out stuff about yourself when you go through stuff like that. I knew I was a tough guy already but having to go through those things and getting those, 'Man, you had such a great career. What a run!' those texts were really trying for me. It was like, damn, people are just assuming it's over because I'm hurt. That was probably the toughest part.

"Being injured and going through the injury and stuff, it's football. Everybody gets hurt at some point, and you bounce back and you go through it, so that wasn't really ever in my mind. But just the response and how people perceived what was going on, it kind of caught me off guard. I think that was the toughest part about the whole thing. Like, people expect me to just tuck it right now. My personality must have not shown that this is not who I am, so I think that was the toughest part of it."

Now that he's past the recovery part of his timeline and is back in the NFL, the 30-year-old can get back to what he does best. He claims his "body is fine" and he's ready to go whenever the Chiefs need him, which head coach Andy Reid confirmed on Wednesday. With that said, Reid acknowledged that the team will "play it by ear" regarding a potential debut for the veteran. That is, of course, assuming he even leapfrogs rookie Kingsley Suamataia on the depth chart and then takes the starting job from Wanya Morris.

Regardless of when or how much he plays, Humphries feels like this is the right football and culture fit for him. Ironically, it's the exact place his son has campaigned for since he shared that he'd be leaving the desert.

"I'm gonna be honest with you, when I first got released, I told my kids," Humphries said. "I told my kids, 'Dad's going to get fired. I'm not going to be on the Cardinals anymore.' I didn't even know how to explain it to them, just to kind of give them a heads up before they went to school and their friends are telling them. My son didn't even know the magnitude of football and all that stuff, but he goes to school and he finds out what's going on like that, you know? I wanted to give him a heads up. My son, Dash, immediately no batting [of] an eyelash, didn't care about me getting released. 'I really want you to go to Kansas City so you can play with Patrick Mahomes and probably win a Super Bowl.' I was like, 'Yeah, son, thank you!' He didn't have a care about what was going on. His automatic mind was like, 'You should go to the Chiefs.'"

With Week 13's Black Friday game against the Las Vegas Raiders on the horizon, Humphries is making his new environment home and feeling good about it in the process.

"Fantastic," Humphries said. "Fantastic. I'm in Kansas City, bro. I'm pretty ecstatic, you know what I mean? It doesn't get much better than this."

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