KC Chiefs' Andy Reid provides important update on Wanya Morris' knee injury against Chicago Bears

The Kansas City Chiefs ended their preseason game against the Chicago Bears on Thursday night. They lost by double digits, but were still able to add experience to many of their reserve players along the way. The reigning Super Bowl champions are also in good health, although offensive tackle Wanya Morris was the only injured player.

Morris suffered a knee injury in the first quarter, had to leave the game and was later ruled out of the team. After Thursday's game, head coach Andy Reid shared his initial thoughts on the injury.

According to Reid, it is a repair of an existing injury.

“Really, there's not much to go on injury-wise,” Reid began. “Wanya was the main one injured. He just twisted his knee a little bit, but other than that we got off pretty clean. He'll be OK – we'll just give him some time here to rest up and get going. He's done a good job when he's had the opportunity.”

Although the best-case scenario would have been injury-free, this is anything but a bad development for the Chiefs. Morris came into the final game of the season with a bone bruise, as Reid revealed after the club's opening game against the Jacksonville Jaguars. Before the bone bruise, Morris had left training camp in early August with a shoulder injury.

During training camp and the preseason, Morris competed with Kingsley Suamataia, who was selected in the 2024 NFL Draft, for the club's left tackle spot. Even before Suamataia was selected, Reid spoke at length about Morris' rookie season and hinted that the Chiefs might bring in someone who could compete with him.

“I thought it was a good start for him,” Reid said. “He came in, had that experience and played in four games. He has an even better sense now of this offseason and what's expected of him when he comes back and is put in that position. There has to be an improvement, there has to be an urgency, and I know he feels that.”

“He's back here in town working. When he wasn't here, he was down in Dallas working out, which is where a lot of players go — quite a few offensive linemen do the same thing there. He's been able to get in that mix and work with those guys, so it looks like he's in pretty good shape right now. I think he knows what it takes to be an every-down guy at that spot. Again, there's going to be competition. He's got to make sure he does a good job there.”

With Morris missing practices this month and now dealing with the same nagging knee issue, it's hard to imagine anyone other than Suamataia being Kansas City's starter at left tackle in Week 1. However, Morris did play in 339 regular season games on offense as a rookie. He offers real game experience that the current rookie simply doesn't have yet, making him at least a valuable backup.

The regular season begins in two weeks, starting Thursday, and Morris will try to make the most of that time to rest and get his knee back to normal as much as possible. He seems to have avoided anything too serious at the end of the preseason.

Read more: Carson Steele's show in the Chiefs' final against the Bears