Kyler Murray considered his lost pawn and strategized his next move.
But before Murray advanced his queen, Cleveland Browns receiver Amari Cooper extended a hand across the chessboard.
“You won,” Cooper told the Arizona Cardinals quarterback at a Dallas-area arena on June 22. “I blundered it.”
“For real?” Murray asked.
“Damn, how I did that? Wowwww,” Cooper said. “I blundered a queen.”
Just an average NFL offseason night, right?
It wouldn’t have been unusual, say, on a Sunday in October, for Murray to compete against Dallas Cowboys pass rusher Micah Parsons, nor for Cooper to match wits with Tennessee Titans cornerback Chidobe Awuzie.
But when those bouts kicked off on a Saturday evening in June, the second-highest-ranked 18-year-old chess player in the country looked on and marveled.
“It’s like two alien-mated worlds, the chess world and the NFL world,” Shar Deviprasath told Yahoo Sports. “The chess world is in its own little bubble. Breaking out of that bubble is necessary to make it grow bigger.
“The bridge is getting closed.”
Browns WR Amari Cooper (right) faces Cardinals QB Kyler Murray during an online stream of their Universal Chess Tour match on June 22. (Screenshot via Jori Epstein)
NFL stars playing chess isn’t anything new. From Baltimore Ravens offensive lineman John Urschel to Cleveland Browns quarterback Deshaun Watson, players have long gravitated toward the 1,400-year-old game to hone their anticipation and decision-making skills. Some quarterback coaches and Power 5 college football programs even integrate chess lessons into their player development programs.
But rarely do four players who play four different positions on four different teams convene for in-person, “over the board” games as they did in this chess tournament. (Browns quarterback Dorian Thompson-Robinson and free-agent running back Melvin Gordon III also competed.) Rarely are chess tournaments staged in an arena capable of holding more than 2,000 spectators.