Brady Quinn Leads On and Off the Field, Wins AFC Offensive Player of the Week

Brady Quinn (9) throws a pass in the second half of the game against the Carolina Panthers at Arrowhead Stadium. Kansas City won 27-21. (Denny Medley-USA TODAY Sports)

No matter what you think of Brady Quinn as an NFL quarterback, the guy is a class act off the field.

While with the Denver Broncos, Quinn was a leader in the locker room and on the practice field. He never complained about not getting a snap in the regular season (What former first round draft pick does that?). He worked hard in practice and did everything in his power to make his teammates better.

There was probably no better guy to have in the Kansas City Chiefs’ locker room over the weekend than Quinn. When Jovan Belcher shot and killed his girlfriend and then himself in front of her mother and his coaches, respectively, it shook the NFL world.

Quinn led the Chiefs to their second win of the season just a day after the shootings, going 19-for-23 for 201 yards and 2 touchdowns. He was named the AFC’s Offensive Player of the Month for his performance on the field, but also for his leadership off of it.

After the game, Quinn said this about the tragedy:

"“The one thing people can hopefully try to take away, I guess, is the relationships they have with people,” Quinn told reporters after the game.  “I know when it happened, I was sitting and, in my head, thinking what I could have done differently.  When you ask someone how they are doing, do you really mean it?  When you answer someone back how you are doing, are you really telling the truth?“We live in a society of social networks, with Twitter pages and Facebook, and that’s fine, but we have contact with our work associates, our family, our friends, and it seems like half the time we are more preoccupied with our phone and other things going on instead of the actual relationships that we have right in front of us.  Hopefully, people can learn from this and try to actually help if someone is battling something deeper on the inside than what they are revealing on a day-to-day basis.” – Brady Quinn (Pro Football Talk)"

Football player or not, these are words to live by.

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