Could the Kansas City Chiefs have brothers who play the same position on their team in the near future?
According to the NFL’s official transaction report, the Chiefs brought in NFL veteran punter Johnny Townsend for a visit. If that name sounds familiar it’s because he’s the older brother of current Chiefs punter Tommy Townsend. Johnny was a fifth-round draft pick by the Oakland Raiders in 2018, but he was waived ahead of the 2019 season and has bounced around ever since.
Both Johnny and Tommy played collegiately for the Florida Gators. Johnny set the all-time punting record for Florida and holds numerous SEC records. In fact, he set the stage for Tommy to come in and take over for someone as esteemed as Dustin Colquitt in Kansas City. Tommy felt prepared to do that because of following in his brother’s footsteps with the Gators.
So why would the Chiefs bring in Johnny for a visit? Well, they’re certainly not disappointed in Tommy. He’s been very impressive as a rookie, he was even recently named to the second-team of PFF’s Midseason All-Pro team. My educated guess is that the Chiefs are merely doing their homework for their call list. With all of the uncertainty surrounding COVID-19, they need to have a backup punter available that they could sign in the event that Tommy was to come down with the virus.
