For years, the Chiefs most recognizable fan operated in the shadows. A regular at games since 1983, Matt Black cheered on KC through very little thick and and a whole lot of thin, an era marked mostly by a series of sports tragedies overseen by then head coach Marty Schottenheimer. Then, on one ordinary day in 2018, Black decided to shave his customary goatee leaving behind a mustache. He gazed into his bathroom mirror, and suddenly it wasn’t Black, a professional opera singer by trade, looking back at him. Instead, it was Chiefs head coach Andy Reid.

“It was purely by accident,” Black told the Guardian via video chat, while donned in full Chiefs regalia, sitting in front of a press conference backdrop that would fool just about anyone into thinking you were speaking to the HC himself. “I had no idea that I looked similar to coach Andy Reid. My wife had booked some tickets for us for a Halloween ball and everybody started coming up to me taking pictures. And I thought, ‘Well, that’s interesting.’”

Black had transformed into his alias, “Almost Andy”, and at just the right time. Three titles and four Super Bowl appearances later, his life has changed in ways he couldn’t possibly have imagined. The “halo effect” that has been bestowed onto Black (and more on him in a moment), has also dramatically sweetened the status of KC, a middle-American city of 510,000 residents that forms the seventh smallest--television market amongst NFL teams.

“What this run means to Kansas City is that we’re on a global platform,” KC mayor Quinton Lucas told the Guardian. “A year ago I was in Paris and had the chance to visit with [French national sports daily] L’Equipe, and they said, wow, ‘Patrick Mahomes, tell us about him. Tell us about Kansas City.’ I’ll be going down to New Orleans. You go there to interact with lots of people around the country and the world who make very big decisions. And so to me, this is why this is so special. This is why, you know, you try to take advantage of it and you realize that this is a unique opportunity to have this ongoing success for a Midwestern city that isn’t always thought about.”

Kansas City wasn’t thought about in 1994 when host cities for the Fifa World Cup were selected, and while we can’t say for sure that the Chiefs putting KC on the global map is directly responsible for their landing 2026 World Cup games, the city’s enhanced profile couldn’t have hurt. Neither has the estimated $500m of direct benefit the mayor says came just from home playoff games during the run.

Then there’s the unlikely ascent of the city’s television and film industry. Kansas City will never be confused with Hollywood, but it’s always had its share of feature film and commercial productions roll into town. Now thanks to the Chiefs and their quarterback, local crews benefit from an annual spring and summer ramp up that takes the industry to a different level.

We call it Patrick season,” KC Film Office director Rachel Kephart told said. “We will film several of his national commercials in Kansas City and some of them are hiring up to 150 people … and it’s pretty special that he chooses to film his projects here. I would imagine he could film them wherever he wanted, but he’s always filmed them here. So we’re really grateful for it.”

As American NFL audiences know full well, you absolutely can not miss Mahomes plugging a certain red-branded insurance company, or a blue shampoo or a pink phone company. Though they may have missed the Hallmark Christmas film, centered around, you guessed it, a Kansas City Chiefs fan – Mahomes sat that one out. Even the Chiefs themselves are getting into the business, announcing their new production studio this week.

As for Black, aka, Almost Andy, he has to be one of the most improbable beneficiaries of the Chiefs’ success. He’s also landed on film sets, where he cozies up to KC’s football celebs as a stand-in for Andy Reid.

“He was sitting there chatting with me one time, he says, ‘yeah, I get texts all the time from even my family members that say, hey, we saw you out at such and such a place.’ He’s like, nope, that wasn’t me.”

Black has perfected the look on and off the field, donning Reid’s traditional threads, mimicking his gait, and impersonating his voice, which he claims has actually helped his on-stage baritone operatic voice.

“I never, ever try to trick anybody. I walk on a plane, they just think that Andy’s there and the pilots and people will come up to me and thank me and stuff. But sometimes they just won’t listen. I can’t convince them otherwise.”

Matt’s head turning is more than just a party trick, it’s a living, or at least a pretty good side hustle. On Friday, Almost Andy was in Los Angeles, filming a Super Bowl segment for Fox, who are broadcasting the big game in the US. Then he’ll make the flight down to New Orleans, where he’ll be making a series of television appearances: so far ABC’s Good Morning America, NBC’s The Tonight Show and the BBC have made inquiries. He has over 600k followers on social media, his own local endorsements and is currently ranked 34th overall on Cameo, spending some two hours a night recording messages.

Nothing can stop Almost Andy, except perhaps coach Reid’s recent weight loss.

“That’s been a little bit of a challenge for me. I keep sending dozens of donuts out there. I don’t know what he’s up to, but he’s not following what I send because he’s been putting off the weight. So I got to take care of that.”

When asked for a prediction for Super Bowl LIX, Almost Andy was careful not to provide the Eagles with any bulletin board material.

“All we need to do is get out there and focus on the job at hand,” he says. “And that’s what we’re going to do as a team.”

Thanks, coach.