LeSean McCoy spent his first six NFL seasons — by far his most productive — with the Philadelphia Eagles. He spent the first four of those under head coach Andy Reid. The year after Reid left, in 2013, McCoy led the league with 1,607 rushing yards. The following year, he added another 1,319.
However, his issues with new head coach Chip Kelly led to his departure to the Buffalo Bills ahead of the 2015 campaign. He earned Pro Bowl honors in each of his first three seasons in Buffalo before falling on harder times in 2018, when he rushed for a career-low 514 yards.
Because of that, when his contract was up following that season, the Bills tried to get McCoy to take a pay cut. The veteran back, looking at Buffalo’s underwhelming roster, took it as an insult. So when Reid — now with the Super Bowl-contending Kansas City Chiefs — offered him a smaller deal, he took it.
“When you get older and you got your own name and all that, they try to put you in a box of mentorship. And I don’t mind mentoring, but yo, I’m burying these dudes,” McCoy started.
“The Bills, I was supposed to make $7 million, and they was like, ‘Yo, let’s take a pay cut.’ And I was like, ‘For what!? You got all these bum-as--linemen, these bum a-- players, why you tryna get my money?'”
McCoy was a decade into his NFL career at that point. He had racked up six Pro Bowls and two First-Team All-Pros as well as six 1,000-yard seasons. He had done it all. Almost. He had yet to win a playoff game, and those Chiefs were primed for a deep run.
“So I said go on release me, I see where this is going. So I got released, and Andy Reid hit me up… Andy said, ‘Look Shady, Ima give you about $4 million,’ but my man was like, ‘Yo, we’re gonna give you six. I got cut for seven,’ so they would give me six. I was like, that’s two million dollars, but I said, ‘Man, we not gonna win over there. We can win over there with Pat, Andy.'”
McCoy ended up signing on with the Chiefs for one year in 2019. He started nine games and rushed for 465 yards and four scores during the regular season. However, Damien Williams took over the main RB duties throughout the postseason. So while Shady did pick up a ring in 2019, he played just one snap throughout the entire playoff run.
He had a similar season with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in 2020. He received just 10 carries for 31 yards during the regular season and played just two snaps in the postseason. But by the end of those 2020 playoffs, he was crowned a Super Bowl champion for the second straight year.
There’s no doubt that taking that slight pay cut in 2019 was well worth it, considering he finished with two rings in his final two years after winning zero playoff games in his first 10 years in the league.
