Houston Texans star Kris Boyd has broken his silence after the shocking moment he shoved his own coach during an NFL playoff defeat to the Kansas City Chiefs.
Boyd stunned viewers after the first play of the game when he ripped his helmet off, stormed to the sidelines and almost knocked special teams coach Frank Ross to the ground.
Fans immediately called for him to be cut from the team, and now Boyd has spoken to reporters to reveal the reason for his furious outburst.
Incredibly, he claims the reason was solely because he ‘got too excited’, adding: ‘I did something I shouldn’t have.’
‘Learning from it,’ he added. ‘Keep my helmet on.’
Boyd then went on to claim he ‘loves Frank’ – referring to special teams coach Ross – and that the response was ‘not in his character’.
‘I love everybody here. I love my coaches. I never disrespect anybody. I apologized to everybody. [Ross] told me “Don’t worry about that”.’
After the game – and the end of the Texans’ season – head coach DeMeco Ryans claimed he didn’t see Boyd’s shove, but called his actions ‘silly’.
‘What I saw is we can’t come out on the first play and throw our helmet,’ he said. ‘That’s not what we teach. That’s not what we’re about at all.
‘It just puts the team in a negative light. To start the game, we give them a big return, we take our helmet off to add 15 more yards into the play, which is not smart football.’
The incident occurred following a 63-yard kickoff return to open the game, when Boyd tossed his helmet to the ground as he appeared to prematurely celebrate forcing a fumble on Nikko Remigio at the end of the play (the ball was actually recovered by the Chiefs).
Boyd’s helmet throw resulted in a 15-yard penalty being tacked onto the return, and he then shockingly shoved Ross after being berated by the special teams coach.
The defensive back continued yelling at Ross after pushing him, which led to the coach putting his hand on the player’s chest to calm him down.
Despite the Chiefs taking their first snap of the game at Houston’s 13-yard-line, the two-time defending champions were held to a field goal.
In the end, though, Patrick Mahomes, Travis Kelce and Co were too strong for the Texans, sealing a 23-14 win to book their annual spot in the AFC Championship game.
Andy Reid’s Super Bowl champions will host either the Bills or Ravens next weekend as their bid for a three-peat continues.
