One Last Run - Chapter 6 | On to Arrowhead

With one season remaining and just one credit hour on his class schedule this semester, the time has arrived for Kansas wideout Luke Grimm to pour everything he’s got into his final season of KU football.

As he does, we’ll follow him every step of the way in this weekly diary that will chronicle Grimm’s 2024 season.

Some of what you’ll read here, in Grimm’s own words, will focus on the stuff happening between the lines — big wins, memorable catches and the grind of the season. But a lot of it will focus on Grimm the person, a 23-year-old senior who has given everything he has to the program and seen it pay off in a big way.

The Grimm File

Age: 23 | Height: 6-0 | Weight: 190 | Position: Wide Receiver

Notable: Last season, Grimm became the 16th Jayhawk to reach the 100-catch mark for his career... The senior wideout enters the 2024 season with 126 career receptions, putting him within striking distance of climbing into 4th place (155) on KU's all-time receiving chart and with an outside shot at cracking the top 3 (214 and 219)... He also is less than 300 yards away from reaching the top 5 on KU's receiving yards list... Dubbed "The Grimm Reaper" early in his career, Grimm appeared in 6 games as a true freshman and has finished each of the past three seasons in the top four in receptions, including leading the team in 2022 and finishing second last season... A 3-star recruit by Rivals.com, 247 Sports & ESPN, Grimm was ranked as the No. 7 wide receiver in the state of Missouri by Max Preps in the 2020 class.

Now, with his team holding massive goals for the 2024 season and the excitement surrounding Kansas football at an all-time high, Grimm is grinning from ear to ear about the potential for his final run with the Jayhawks.

After playing their first two home games of the 2024 season at Children’s Mercy Park down the road in Kansas City, Kansas, the Jayhawks are moving up to the big time and 76,000-seat Arrowhead Stadium, home of the Kansas City Chiefs, for their final four home games.

The opportunity has been talked about for months and several Kansas players have been asked about their excitement of playing in the venue and what it felt like to practice inside the stadium back in August.

In this week’s chapter of “One Last Run” with Luke Grimm, the KU wideout gives his perspective of playing at Arrowhead.

“It’ll be awesome. For the guys who grew up Chiefs fans, especially. Jared for sure. Trevor Kardell. Mikey Pauley. All those guys who grew up as Chiefs fans and went to games. It’s just cool where you get to be on the other side of that, where you’re on the field actually playing.”

“All of us, we grow up dreaming of playing in the NFL and in an NFL stadium and we get to live half of that dream this weekend. You get to play in that stadium, which is just so cool.”

Earlier this week, KU defensive tackle Caleb Taylor said that August practice at Arrowhead helped the Jayhawks get the “oohs and ahhhs” of the experience out of the way. It’s all about business now.

Grimm agrees but said there might still be a few wow moments on Saturday.

“The best part of being on the field already is just knowing how it feels and how it’s gonna play, along with things like the transition between the locker room to the field, what you need to do, where you need to go, where the training room is, even where the bathroom’s at. Being there before helps out a lot.”

“For the warm-ups, it’ll be obviously very different from what we’re used to. But once the game starts, it’s still football at the end of the day. The only thing that’ll be different is it’s got the NFL hash marks and NFL numbers on it. Kind of like when a high school plays at a college arena in basketball and there are a couple different 3-point lines.”

While he’s looking forward to experiencing the pro feel of Arrowhead Stadium and also can’t wait for Nov. 16 to play at BYU, with its picturesque, mountain backdrop, Grimm said his favorite road venue to date sits one state south.

“I’d say probably Oklahoma. I love their stadium, and I thought it was so cool to play there. It went straight up. A lot of stadiums kind of bow out, but I loved that OU’s went straight up. It made it feel like everyone was on top of you.”

Although he grew up in nearby Raymore, Missouri, which sits just 21 miles south of Arrowhead, Grimm was not a Chiefs fan as a child.

Even though his dad and grandfather had season tickets since before he was born until the time he was 7 or 8 — as best as Grimm remembers, anyway — no one in his family cared that much about the Chiefs.

His dad, Todd, grew up in Illinois and is a lifelong Chicago Bears fan. His mom, Pepper, gradually grew into being a Chiefs fan but didn’t care much about the team when Grimm was young. And his sister, Maddi, has never really cared about the NFL.

So Grimm went with style of city and became a fan of the Philadelphia Eagles, who also happened to wear his favorite color, green, as their primary color.

“For one, my favorite player when I was a kid was (wide receiver) Jeremy Maclin and he got drafted by the Eagles and I also loved Donovan McNabb, Brian Westbrook, Brian Dawkins, Michael Vick, Desean Jackson. All those guys. I was like, this team is just so fun to watch, they’re just throwing deep balls down the field all the time, making big plays and the guys on defense, like Dawkins, are out there knocking people’s heads off.”

While that never bothered his family members, it didn’t sit well with everyone in his life.

“It was kind of just a bunch of different fan bases in my immediate family, but my friends were all Chiefs fans and they all hated me when the Chiefs played the Eagles. It was great.”

Eventually, when Grimm was 14 or 15 years old, Maclin actually joined the Chiefs. Two years earlier, former Eagles coach Andy Reid became the Chiefs head coach.

So, why not start pulling for KC then?

“The thing is, I don’t want to be considered a bandwagon fan and the Chiefs just got too good for me to jump on and say, ‘Oh, I’ll be a fan of them now.’”

Fair enough.

With that being said, at least part of Saturday’s experience will include Grimm thinking about how he’s playing on the same field and walking through the same tunnels that McNabb and Maclin, as well as Patrick Mahomes and Travis Kelce, have done during their days as pro football stars.

“It’ll be cool to think I’m playing on the same field as so many greats have played and all the guys that play there now. But, to me, I’m just so excited to play there with my team and be there with these guys. We’ve built the opportunity to be able to do this and I’m just really looking forward to playing there with the guys I love and guys I’ve helped build the program with.”

That mindset positions Grimm well to not be worried about how many Kansas fans come out to support the 1-3 Jayhawks in this one, which is slated for a 2:30 p.m. kickoff (on ESPN+) on a perfect fall day.

“There could be one, there could be a million; it doesn’t matter. I’m gonna play the same level of football and every single guy is on the team, as well. I’ve been through it with a lot these guys during COVID when there was nobody there and we’ve played in front of 70,000-80,000 people, too. So, no one or everyone, we’re gonna be the same team and play as hard as we can.”