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Kelce could focus on the rest of the night. A shiny black suit hung in her locker.
A colleague passed by and gave him a hug.
“Mother f—— Super Bowl champions,” Kelce said.
A reporter asked Kelce where he was going next.
“Las Vegas is rolling out the red carpet,” he responded. “You might as well call me Elvis.”
The most magical season ended for the Chiefs on Sunday with a second straight Super Bowl victory, their third in six seasons. They have a world-class quarterback, Patrick Mahomes, who may be the best to ever play the most glamorous position in sports. On the CBS broadcast, analyst Tony Romo called him “Michael Jordan” after he threw the game-winning touchdown pass in overtime to beat the San Francisco 49ers, 25-22.
But it’s Kelce, the 34-year-old tight end with a lush beard, who makes the Chiefs the closest thing this century to Jordan’s Bulls. It’s Kelce who makes the Chiefs a cultural phenomenon, who somehow made the NFL feel even bigger thanks to his budding romance with Taylor Swift.
Kelce had a solid performance in the Super Bowl. He had nine catches for 93 yards, including a key catch on the game-tying drive late in regulation, and played a key decoy role on the game-winning pass to Mecole Hardman. After the game, as confetti fell, he led the crowd with one of his favorite songs: “You Gotta Fight for Your Right to Party.”
All of that, however, was a prologue, at least for most Americans, to the championship-sealing kiss between Kelce and Swift on the field at Allegiant Stadium, the two stars surrounded by hordes of cameras. “That woman is about to cry,” Nate Burleson said on the CBS broadcast. “Travis is excited. That is true love. That’s what you can achieve when you have the support of a woman behind you.”
The scene was the culmination of a season that catapulted Kelce to A-list levels of fame. He appeared in more commercials during NFL games than any other player. He hosted “Saturday Night Live.” His podcast took off. His brother became a meme. Thanks to Swift’s presence, more girls tuned in to NFL games. His attendance at the Super Bowl It was a matter of interest to the Japanese embassy.
As teams across sports have preached the value of limiting distractions, this title was a validation of the Chiefs’ embrace of all distractions, a cardinal sin in most locker rooms.
“More attention is more fun,” Chiefs linebacker Nick Bolton said. Chiefs owner Clark Hunt added: “You could never imagine the impact their relationship would have on the Chiefs. We now have a whole new fan base, predominantly young women who didn’t watch NFL games before. But now they make appointments to watch Chiefs games.”
It was almost a different night for Kelce. In the first quarter of the game, he was on the bench when running back Isiah Pacheco fumbled. Kelce angrily confronted Andy Reid on the sideline and nearly knocked his 66-year-old coach to the ground.
“I was just telling him how much I love him,” Kelce said after the game. What could have been a key story if the Chiefs had lost became barely a footnote. A charmed life, indeed.
As for how he and the Chiefs overcame a slow start and a 10-0 deficit, Kelce said simply: “Stop playing like a jabroni, man.”
The night before the game, the Chiefs had gathered for a meeting. Kelce stood up and addressed the team. After the victory, player after player cited the speech as a key moment in their preparation. “Whatever Travis is saying, I need to bottle it up and sell it,” safety Justin Reid said. “That was just the maximum juice, the maximum passion. You felt it throughout the room. He touched everyone who was in that room and they heard his voice.”
Kelce would only say that he told his teammates that they had a winning formula that the 49ers didn’t.
A year ago, after Kansas City’s victory over the Philadelphia Eagles in Super Bowl LVII, Kelce said it was the best year of his life. This season he must surely have surpassed it. “Just when you think things couldn’t get any better,” he said before disappearing into the bowels of the stadium. Videos later circulated on social media of her and Swift’s arrival at the Chiefs’ afterparty at a Las Vegas hotel. Kelce was wearing the shiny black suit that she hung in her locker.
Previously, a reporter had asked Kelce which Swift song she would listen to first at the party.
“Whatever the DJ plays,” Kelce said.