Kadarius Toney made his final appearance in a Kansas City Chiefs jersey in the Chiefs’ final preseason game.

“He’s a talented kid,” Chiefs head coach Andy Reid said after the game. “He fought to get into the team.”

On Tuesday, the Chiefs released the 25-year-old receiver before his fourth regular season.

After recording just 41 catches for 340 yards in a year and a half with Kansas City, his tenure with the Chiefs is obviously considered unproductive.

But that doesn’t mean that the mid-season transfer of 2022 was a bad one for him. In fact, it paid off at the most crucial time.

Hero of Super Bowl LVII

Without him, the Chiefs probably wouldn’t win the hotly contested Super Bowl LVII.

In the Chiefs’ 38-35 win over the Philadelphia Eagles, Toney scored a completely open five-yard touchdown with 12:04 left in the game on a play that gave the Chiefs an incredible 11.2 yards gain, giving them their first lead of the game.

After Philadelphia’s ensuing three-and-out, Toney made one of the game-deciding plays of Super Bowl LVII, return a punt 65 yards to the Eagles’ five-yard line. That was the longest punt return in Super Bowl history and set up the Chiefs’ final touchdown of the game.

After his seemingly outstanding performance, the Chiefs expected great things from him for 2023. They even see him as a potential No. 1 wide receiver.

Instead, he missed all of training camp after undergoing surgery to repair a torn meniscus in his knee, and an error-prone regular season followed.

Worst of all, he dropped several passes in the Detroit Lions’ 21-20 upset win in Week 1, including one that led to a pick-six by Brian Branch. Against the Buffalo Bills, he was offside, preventing a touchdown on a lateral pass by Travis Kelce.

In his terrible 2023 season, he only managed 27 catches for 169 yards and one touchdown.

Additionally, the Chiefs offense only seemed to get going after the team took him out of action.

The Chiefs endured a rough postseason that included a cold battle with the Miami Dolphins, road games against the Buffalo Bills and Baltimore Ravens, and an overtime Super Bowl against the San Francisco 49ers, and Toney did not play in any of those games.

In his very first preseason game of 2024, Toney committed two penalties – illegally covering tight end Irv Smith Jr. and holding on the perimeter for Deneric Prince.

Low-risk acquisition

But even though Toney only joined for one game, it was still an excellent move.

It cost little, both in terms of trade capital (a third-round pick and a sixth-round pick) and money.

His salary and salary cap numbers for 2022, 2023 and 2024, as he is still on a rookie contract, were $784,000, $1.907 million and $2.531 million, respectively.

While the Chiefs have invested little in Toney, it is the New York Giants who would have to make a fool of themselves.

They selected him 20th overall in the 2021 NFL Draft. (Three spots later, Minnesota Vikings offensive tackle Christian Darrisaw was drafted, who would have helped fix the defensive woes that have been a persistent problem for New York.)

Toney started his final game in Kansas City’s uniform – the loss to the Chicago Bears in Week 3 of preseason – and looked good, catching two passes, including one for 20 yards.

But the writing was on the wall. It’s never a good sign for a veteran to play in the last game of the preseason.

After that game, Reid was asked about Toney’s status.

“We never questioned his talent,” he said. “The most important thing was that he stayed healthy.”