Chiefs’ 2025 Bye Week Awards: Who wins top special teams player?

Chiefs’ 2025 Bye Week Awards: Who wins top special teams player?
Arrowhead Pride Arrowhead Pride

There are nine games in the books — with eight more to go. The Kansas City Chiefs are taking their bye week in Week 10, so it’s time to dish out some midseason awards.

10 Arrowhead Pride contributors voted to award seven midseason awards. In this post, we’ll reveal our top special teams player to this point of the season.


KR – Nikko Remigio

VOTING: WR Nikko Remigio (5), P Matt Araiza (2), LB Jeffrey Bassa (1), LS (James Winchester), LB Jack Cochrane (1)

Picking a special teams MVP is always difficult. The plays are the hardest to follow — few fans truly understand the finer points of special teams — and the players change frequently.

But few Kansas City special teams players have drawn more praise from coordinator Dave Toub than the former Fresno State (and California) wideout, who spent his 2023 rookie season on the team’s Reserve/Injured list, began 2024 on the practice squad and has spent all of 2025 on the 53-man roster.

“I’ve gotten used to having him back there,” noted Toub as this season was getting underway. “He just keeps getting better — and he really had a great training camp. He’s become a leader for us, as far as his work ethic and everything he’s about. He’s a great teammate — and he’s a good guy. And I’m happy he’s on the team.”

In early October, Toub raved about him again.

“He’s a guy I can depend on,” he declared. “I call him, ‘the adult in the room.’ He’s the oldest guy back there.”

So far, the 25-year-old Remigio has appeared in 14 games. He’s returned 26 punts for 228 yards (8.8 per return) and 25 kickoffs for 665 yards (26.6 per return).

But he understands that in the NFL, the pressure for performance never subsides.

“If you get too comfortable, you’re gonna get got,” he told reporters during training camp. “I worked too hard to get to this point in my career — to get to Year 3 — to let it slip through my fingers. So, you know, really, I approach every day like I’m an undrafted rookie that barely got a shot to make it to the NFL. [So] I’m scratching and clawing to just get an opportunity.”

“He’s very competitive,” offered head coach Andy Reid during camp. “They’re all competing like crazy for six or seven spots is what you’re looking at. They’re in there battling their tails off to make one of those positions — and Remigio is doing that. I know you know him and how competitive a kid he is. Everything he does, he’s competitive.”