It didn't take long for teams to come calling Eric Winston after he was surprisingly released by the Houston Texans last week, but one team's efforts stood above the rest: the Chiefs.
Winston was inked to a four-year, $22 million pact by Kansas City on Saturday, and he spent some time with the team's official website to discuss the Chiefs' recruitment process, his impressions of Kansas City, and the passion of Chiefs fans, amongst other topics.
On being recruited by GM Scott Pioli, head coach Romeo Crennel, and others: "The organization really put on a full court press. Mr. [Scott] Pioli called me multiple times, Coach [Romeo] Crennel called me, Coach [Brian] Daboll, Coach [Jack] Bicknell. They did so much more than I think any other organization did. Obviously, most organizations, the GM calls, ‘Hey, we're excited about you coming,' or the head coach calls, ‘Oh, we're excited about the possibility of having you here,' but the organization kind of put on a press of, hey, it's not just me, it's everybody and that meant a lot to me."
On Kansas City: "To tell you the truth, I thought it was more of a rustbelt city and I had never been there. When you get there, you learn that it's far from it. It's a beautiful city. It's a beautiful place. I was pretty blown away with just the overall atmosphere of Kansas City."
On Chiefs fans pleading with Winston to sign via Twitter: "Oh man, I tell you what, that was something else. My Twitter blew up obviously when I was released and got a lot of messages from a lot of people. I feel like the fans from Kansas City probably blew it up five times more than anyone else's fan base. Every day, it was, ‘Come to Kansas City. Come to Kansas City,' and then obviously when it was made known that I was in town, I had hundreds of mentions every day. To give you an idea of what that is, I usually have 50 or 75 mentions after a big game, and every day, just random mentions by all the fans, hundreds of them. I was really taken aback."
The Winston signing is being viewed by many as the Chiefs filling their biggest need this offseason, as he'll replace Barry Richardson - who struggled throughout 2011 - as the starting right tackle.
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