‘That’s lit, man’: Why a Chiefs rookie’s destiny captivated his teammate’s attention

JuJu Smith-Schuster broke tackles and continued up the field, taking a reception 69 yards for the Pittsburgh Steelers against the New England Patriots on Dec. 17, 2017.

Back in New Kensington, Pennsylvania — 20 miles north of Pittsburgh — a 17-year-old Steelers fan lifted his phone, jumping up and down while recording his celebration.

“Let’s go, JuJu! Let’s go, JuJu! Quit playin’ with them, JuJu! Let’s go!”

Five years and two months later, during a media session ahead of Super Bowl LVII, Chiefs receiver Skyy Moore smiles while rewatching the video.

Of himself.

“That turned me up,” Moore said. “It was like a full-circle moment, right? Now he’s my teammate. Now his locker’s right next to mine.”

Smith-Schuster remembers Moore bringing up the video one of the first times they met in KC. “Bro, I used to watch you on TV,” was one of the first things Moore said to him. Moore also shared the high-school video with the man that now shares a huddle with him.

Smith-Schuster was shown the clip again as media met with Wednesday at the team’s hotel in Scottsdale. When the clip began, he grabbed a reporter’s iPhone to show it to the TV cameras in front of him.

“Everybody look at this,” Smith-Schuster said, pressing play on Moore’s recorded celebration again. “ ... That’s lit, man. That’s lit.”

Smith-Schuster can relate to Moore. The sixth-year pro said he grew up watching quarterback Ben Roethlisberger, then after getting drafted by the Steelers, immediately got the locker next to the future hall-of-fame quarterback.

“Same thing with Skyy Moore. I didn’t really know him that well, but he knew of me,” Smith-Schuster said. “And then fast forward, we’re on the same team, and we’re in the Super Bowl together, so that’s really cool.”

It’s just one element of Moore’s path to Super Bowl Sunday that has a predestined-type feeling.

Consider this: Moore’s mother, Timika Hastie, once posted a school photo of Skyy on Facebook with the caption, “This is def an NFL player in the making!”

That was Nov. 7, 2011. Skyy was 11 years old.

“She believed in me at a young age,” Moore said. “I told her what I wanted to do when I was in first grade, and she stuck to that. I had no choice but to live up to that, because I used to always say it.”

Moore’s NFL dreams continued at Western Michigan, when in 2020, he shared a story link on Facebook about another New Kensington native living out his Super Bowl dream.

That was David Girardi, who remains with the Chiefs as the team’s current pass game analyst and assistant quarterbacks coach.

“That’s wild,” Girardi said Wednesday when shown the Facebook entry. “I didn’t know he did that.”

Girardi has plenty of ties to Moore from his time in New Kensington — a town of just over 12,000. Girardi’s older brother, Dom, played quarterback and was teammates with Skyy’s cousin, Devon Moore, during their playing days at Valley High School.

David Girardi and Skyy Moore also played with the same youth team, “Ar-Ken,” while growing up in the area.

On Moore’s first visit to KC after getting drafted, Girardi told his family that he was from New Kensington. He said they didn’t believe him at first.

A few days ago, Girardi saw that one of the New Kensington schools was celebrating “Skyy Moore Day” deep in Steelers country.

“It’s exciting being from that area, small town and being here together,” Girardi said. “It’s pretty special.”

Moore wouldn’t have had this current opportunity, though, without constant self-belief.

At the end of last season — his junior year — he had a decision about whether to declare or return to college. Moore said Western Michigan coach Tim Lester called up NFL contacts he knew to gather information about where he might be projected.

The final word? Fifth round. Which also meant going undrafted was a possibility too.

Only Moore saw that a different way.

“When I first heard fifth round, I was like, ‘OK, maybe I can bump that up,’” Moore said. “I was like, ‘OK, that’s a good starting point. We can bump that up.’”

Moore still wrestled with the choice. He slept on it. Prayed about it. He said Lester offered that returning to Western Michigan could solidify his draft status for 2023.

“He’s basically telling me, ‘You’re gonna get exactly what you want. You’re gonna be the player who you want to be. Just wait another year. Just come back for your senior year,’” Moore said. “I’m saying, ‘I think I am him now.’”

In the end, Moore took advice from his family and friends to do what he felt was best. He described a feeling deep in his stomach that he was ready for the next level.

Moore declared for the NFL Draft in January 2022, then after getting a Combine invite, ran a 4.41 40-yard dash there to shoot up draft boards. A month later, the Chiefs selected him in the second round with the 54th pick.

“Our coaches loved him,” Chiefs general manager Brett Veach said. “And it’s hard not to like a guy like that who does everything the right way.”

Moore’s story has been one of resilience this season.

Veach says in drafting Moore, the team “really just wanted to grow and develop him.” That was sidetracked, though, when Moore suffered a hamstring injury in the summer, which kept him out of drills for both rookie mini-camp and OTAs.

Moore fell to third- and fourth-team snaps at the start of the summer. The Chiefs tried to still involve him on special teams by making him the punt returner, but that failed early while Moore adjusted to a role he’d never been asked to perform in college. He muffed three punt returns during the season and after the final one, requested to the coaches he not go out there anymore.

It set up the AFC Championship Game two weeks ago. With KC down its top three returners because of illness and injury, Moore stepped in to deliver one of the game’s biggest plays: a 29-yard punt return down the right sideline to set up Harrison Butker’s game-winning 45-yard field goal.

“That’s what the league will do to you. It’ll humble you, but you give to the game what you’re supposed to give, it’ll build you up,” Moore said. “I feel like that was a big moment for me, for sure.”

The play also brought Moore closer to closing another loop of his NFL story.

Moore had a film crew follow him after he was drafted in April. Late that night, he turned to friends while still taking in that the Chiefs had selected him.

“I’m about to win the Super Bowl,” he said, before laughing out loud. “You feel me?”

Moore, when shown the video this week, didn’t need the sound turned up.

He remembered exactly what he’d said that night.

“That shows you that words are very powerful,” Moore said. “I wasn’t lying.”