Aug 19, 2016One of Five
Tiffany Morton, hired by the Kansas City Chiefs in March, is the newest of five female athletic trainers in the NFL. According to the Kansas City Chiefs’ website, Morton initially hoped to go to medical school, but after meeting with a career counselor at Auburn University, took the path to becoming an athletic trainer.
Formerly an intern for the Chiefs, Morton closely worked with Jeremy Maclin, a wide receiver. Impressed with Morton’s work, Maclin then asked Head Athletic Trainer Rick Burkholder, “when are you going to hire her?”
“I think for starters, to be a woman and to be in a male-dominate atmosphere, she handles herself really well,” Maclin said. “I think as far as what goes on in the training room and her knowledge of the body and everything, she’s exceptional.”
Burkholder said Morton was an exception to the traditional progression for interns, going from a summer internship to a year-long seasonal internship to a full-time position.
“I wanted the best athletic trainer and I was hoping that it was a female because we’re trying to promote that in the National Football League,” Burkholder said. “It’s an interesting time in athletic training. We have a lot of female athletic trainers, but not a lot in the NFL.
Morton said that while she does not want to be known for being the first female athletic trainer as much as being known as someone who takes care of her athletes, she also recognizes that she has an influence on others, such as one woman who approached her recently.
“She’s like, ‘You have no idea what this means to us,’” Morton said about the woman. “Honestly, I’m so busy trying to just be a good athletic trainer that I should remember sometimes that I’m a female in the NFL because a lot of females who wanted to work in the NFL 10 years ago, or even five years ago—they didn’t have the opportunity.”
