The Kansas City Chiefs beat the Indianapolis Colts on Sunday night, and Ashton Gillotte had an eventful evening.
The Kansas City Chiefs have a reputation for tolerating players who get in trouble with the law, but some players don’t fit the mold. One example is defensive lineman Ashton Gillotte, who helped a pair of Chiefs fans out after Kansas City’s 33-30 OT win over the Indianapolis Colts on Sunday night.
The extra period meant that everyone was late to embark on the trip home, according to Jesse Newell of the Athletic, who delivered an account of the incident. Gillotte was among the masses who got stuck in traffic after spending time with his mother and friends on the field, and he was as frustrated as everyone else.
But Gillotte was in a position to do something about it, so he did. The reason for the backup was a stalled van that was blocking the road out of the parking lot at Arrowhead, and a pair of Chiefs fans were having trouble pushing the red-and-yellow vehicle out of the way.
Enter the defensive lineman. Gillotte decided to pull over, and he got out and offered to help. Not surprisingly, the van began to move, and Gillotte’s friends also got in on the Good Samaritan routine.
The van was quickly relocated to a safe spot off the road so the fans could wait for a tow truck, and the remarkable thing about the incident was that the couple never recognized him. This was fine by Gillotte, who was happy to remain anonymous given what would have occurred if he’d been ID’d.
It was the end of a busy night for Gillotte, who played 28 defensive snaps against the Colts, including 16 in the fourth quarter and overtime when the Chiefs defense came through with a pair of critical stops, per Newell.
The writer asked Gillotte what it was like pushing the van after doing the same thing against a bunch of other 300-pound linemen, and he noted that the van was “heavier than I thought it was gonna be.” He added that the vehicle was actually closer to “one of those passenger busses,” and Gillotte took the same approach he would when doing a sled push in practice, calling it “a little extra workout.”
His other comments were exactly what you’d hope for from anyone in this situation who happened to have lineman strength to get the job done. Gillotte noted that he was just trying to help out, and that’s really “how you’re supposed to treat people.” A cynic might suggest that one of those Derrick Henry workout commercials might be next up, but this is really too good a story to go there.
