Joe Burrow hates the color red. Or shorts that are too long.
He may be one of the NFL’s most fashionable athletes, but even the Cincinnati Bengals' quarterback has hard lines he won’t cross — and Kyle Smith, the man behind his headline-making tunnel looks, has them memorized.
“We’re probably never going to see him in a fully red outfit,” Smith, the NFL’s first-ever fashion editor, tells me with a knowing laugh. And, no — it’s not because red happens to be the Kansas City Chiefs’ team color. “He just doesn’t like red.”
It’s not Burrow’s only sartorial pet peeve, Smith adds. “Some other things he’ll never do? [Wear] shorts that go past the knee,” the stylist says. “He hates shorts that go past the knee. You know, fair. We can focus on much bigger problems here — like wearing the Bottega bag.”
That woven leather Bottega carryall — which turned heads and fueled plenty of internet discourse — made its now-famous appearance during Quarterback , Netflix’s docuseries following Burrow and other NFL stars. The moment is quick but unforgettable: a fitting room scene between Smith and Burrow, where cameras capture the two men mid-styling session.
“That’s so crazy because I didn’t know I was going to be on that show until like 10 minutes before we started filming,” Smith recalls. “I just looked Joe in the eye, and I was like, ‘I don’t want to do this.’ He was like, ‘Please.’”
That moment may have lasted only a few seconds onscreen, but it said everything about their working relationship: one that’s built on trust, collaboration and a shared understanding that fashion, like football, is a game of bold moves.
