After missing out on January football for the first time since 2014, Kansas City Chiefs head coach Andy Reid ignited one of the biggest coaching overhauls we’ve ever seen. They let wide receivers coach Connor Embree go after seven years with the team, and brought in former Patriots coach Chad O’Shea to fill the position. NFL Legend, Rob Gronkowski, for one, has given his stamp of approval.

“A smart guy, very smart. Knows the game of football, no doubt about it,” Gronk said, appearing on the ‘Up & Adams Show with Kay Adams.‘ “He’s a top guy, probably a top-three receiver coach in the NFL.”

Gronkowski went on to point out O’Shea’s grasp of offensive structure and, just as importantly, his ability to connect with players. Even with experience as an offensive coordinator, O’Shea has always seemed comfortable working directly with receivers, meeting them where they are and pulling more out of them.

That’s a reassuring message for Chiefs fans, because the wide receiver room clearly needed a reset. Embree had been in charge of the group for the past three seasons, and in that span, Kansas City never produced a 1,000-yard receiver.

There’s a fair argument that Rashee Rice might have changed that story if his season hadn’t been so fractured. He missed the first six games due to a suspension and the final three with a concussion. In between, he played eight games, caught 53 passes for 571 yards, and scored five touchdowns.

Bringing in Chad O’Shea was a big decision, and it’s one the Chiefs made knowing exactly what they were getting. He arrived from the Cleveland Browns, where he spent six seasons and took over as the wide receivers coach in 2020. That season, Cleveland scored 408 points, the second-highest total in franchise history, and saw noticeable bumps across nearly every receiving metric.

Under O’Shea, Amari Cooper posted back-to-back 1,000-yard seasons in 2022 and 2023, becoming the first Browns player ever to do so. Last season, Jerry Jeudy added a 1,229-yard campaign of his own. Those are pretty impressive benchmarks, even if the list of players who reached them during O’Shea’s tenure was relatively short.

But not everything clicked in Cleveland. Even Odell Beckham Jr. and Jarvis Landry never quite found sustained success there. But much of that came against the backdrop of constant turnover and uncertainty at quarterback. That won’t be the case in Kansas City.

Working with Patrick Mahomes and coaching a group that includes Xavier Worthy alongside Rice presents a very different set of circumstances. Stability and expectations will all be higher. And for O’Shea, that might be exactly the environment where his approach shows up most clearly.

He already has a pretty good resume. He turned things around in New England, and if we’re going by Gronk’s words, he essentially shaped former Patriots WR Julian Edelman‘s career.

Gronk makes a bold claim about O’Shea and Julian Edelman

Julian Edelman was one of the most explosive route runners of his time and a big pillar behind the Patriots’ dynasty. Over his career, he racked up 620 receptions for 6,822 yards and 36 touchdowns. And if you ask Rob Gronkowski, a lot of that story traces back to former Pats WRs coach Chad O’Shea.

“I would say he’s responsible for Julian Edelman’s career in New England, that’s for sure,” Gronk said. “He was there in the prime of Randy Moss and Wes Welker at the wide receiver position; he was the coach. He helped establish that and help that offense grow, help those WRs be on the same page as Tom Brady. He’s got so much knowledge of the game of football.”

Chad O’Shea coached the Patriots’ wide receivers from 2009 through 2018. That stretch just happened to overlap with one of the most dominant runs the league has ever seen—five Super Bowls, and a receiver group that delivered every single season.

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During that span alone, Edelman caught 499 passes for 5,390 yards and 30 touchdowns. Randy Moss played in New England from 2007 to 2010, and when O’Shea joined the staff in 2009, Moss responded with 1,264 yards and 13 touchdowns. Wes Welker, meanwhile, posted three 1,000-yard seasons under O’Shea’s watch.

Bringing him to the Chiefs was imperative. This season, the Kansas City Chiefs ranked around 10th in the league, converting roughly 61.5 percent of their red-zone trips into touchdowns. Back in 2018, O’Shea’s final year with the New England Patriots, New England scored touchdowns on 76.92 percent of its red-zone opportunities over the final three games.

Since 2007, O’Shea has been part of 10 offenses that finished top 10 in red-zone touchdown percentage. Kansas City, by comparison, hasn’t cracked the top 10 in that category in any of the last three seasons.

O’Shea clearly knows how to get the best out of his players. In Chiefs, that’s all that he needs to do.