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.

Inside Burrow’s style playbook

When Smith first met Burrow, it wasn’t over coffee for a vibe check; it was a clothes fitting. “I came in blind with a bunch of stuff, just hoping to see what he’d gravitate toward,” Smith recalls. Burrow, quiet and imposing, took it all in. “Joe comes in very tall and kind of scary,” Smith jokes. “But I’m also very tall and possibly scary — so we were a perfect match.”

As it turns out, they’re both 6'4" — which makes clothes-swapping not only possible but occasionally practical. Still, the real connection came from something else entirely: shared curiosity. “What I found out about Joe is that he loves space and dinosaurs,” Smith says. “So I like incorporating those details into his looks. It makes it personal.”

And personal is the priority. While Smith brings the fashion expertise, it’s Burrow’s personality and mood that lead the way. “I get this question a lot: ‘What trends can we expect this season?’” Smith says. “But athletes don’t care about trends. They’re not looking for them. They’re setting them.”

After a turf toe injury sidelined Burrow in Week 2 this season, he made his triumphant return on Nov. 27. Walking into the Baltimore Ravens' stadium in a cropped white Alo sherpa jacket and plaid wide-leg trousers, Burrow delivered the kind of quietly confident look that fans had been missing. The hair was longer (to the delight of X, formerly Twitter), the energy cool and composed. It was a fashion reset as much as a football one — a signal that Burrow wasn’t just back; he was still very much him.

As Smith puts it, “There are a few things Joe, at the beginning of us working together, would never do. And then he is slowly kind of trying on some new things. And it’s interesting then to see what the fans say. … I’m like, ‘Yeah, I know. I know it’s a good look.’”

Game-day looks — from a squiggle two-piece ahead of Monday Night Football to a Chrome Hearts suit paired with an orange Birkin bag — are rarely planned far in advance. “I don’t think a lot of players know what they’re going to be wearing Week 18,” Smith says. “It always, you know, depends on your mood. You wake up one day and you’re like, Who am I today? What do I want to express today?”

In Burrow’s case, that expression might be a bold silhouette, a hint of vintage prep or something more unexpected — like a backless Thom Browne suit on the "Vogue World: Paris" runway. But even with riskier looks, Smith says the priority is authenticity, not shock value.

The tunnel is their red carpet

As the NFL’s first fashion editor, Smith has the rare task of helping the league look good — literally. And while red carpets used to belong to movie stars and musicians, he says football players are now fully in the mix.

“Honestly, the tunnel is a red carpet,” Smith says. “With actors, you’re promoting a film. With athletes, it’s themselves — their brand, their personality.”

Smith should know. Before joining the league, he was a celebrity stylist, but working with players is different. “It used to feel like you had to choose: Were you a sports person or a fashion person?” he says. “Now? You can be both. You can lose the game — and still have a great outfit.”

The impact is visible far beyond the field. “These are the trends that we saw originate in the tunnel — like, now every kid in high school is wearing this thing that some player wore Week 8,” Smith says. “That’s the ripple effect.”

And while Burrow garners the most headlines, Smith is quick to shout out others making waves. “Stefon Diggs — always has his own sense of style, always supporting new brands. But also guys like Dorian Thompson-Robinson, Ogbo Okoronkwo, Grant Delpit, Kenny Moore, Puka Nacua — they’re all doing amazing things.”

That’s what excites him most — the range. “We have tons of players on every single team,” Smith says. “And what I love about that is that there's just a breadth of bodies and styles for any fan to kind of align themselves with.”

There’s no single formula. “Some guys are in full designer. Some shop on Amazon. There’s something for everyone,” he says. “And that’s what makes it fun.”

Dressing the part

For Smith, styling is never about just what someone wears — it’s about how they feel in it. That’s especially true with athletes like Burrow, who are navigating intense public scrutiny while building a personal brand off the field. “If we’re going to do something bold, we think about why we’re doing this and how,” Smith says. “I think that’s something that’s very important to me about fashion: What are you trying to say with it?”

That intentionality is what keeps the collaboration working. It’s not about pushing limits just to go viral. It’s about evolving while staying grounded in who the player really is — and, more important, wants to be. “If we’re going to do something bold, we think about what it’s saying. I always want the look to say something about who the person is,” Smith says. “And when you see the fans respond positively? That just reinforces that we’re doing it right.”

There may be no red in Burrow’s future, and definitely no long shorts — but that doesn’t mean he’s playing it safe. From the tunnel to the runway, Burrow’s looks continue to signal one thing: He’s fully in control of his image. And Kyle Smith is right there with him — making sure every fit tells the story, even before the first snap.