Swifties and football fans uniting – that definitely wasn’t on my 2023 bingo card.
While this sounds absurd, it is a very real situation, all due to a new and exciting romance between Taylor Swift and Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce.
Rumors of the two having a connection began in July when Kelce attended Swift’s history-making Eras Tour at Arrowhead Stadium in Kansas City. Later that month, Travis spoke about his experience at the concert on him and his brother Jason’s podcast, New Heights. He recounted the concert, sharing his disappointment that Taylor Swift didn’t talk to fans before or after the show so he was unable to give her a friendship bracelet he made with his phone number on it. After the podcast, fans of both stars began to speculate a relationship between the two, and ambiguous answers about the relationship in interviews with both, Travis and Jason, only perpetuated the media frenzy.
After a couple months of hearsay and speculation, Taylor Swift made a move to all but confirm a relationship between the two, unexpectedly showing up at the Kansas City Chiefs and Chicago Bears game on September 24 donning Kansas City Chiefs merchandise. Not only did she attend the game, she watched the game from Kelce’s private box and was seen conversing, laughing, and drinking with his mother Donna. Swift was seen exuberantly reacting whenever the Chiefs scored, but a Travis Kelce touchdown late in the game elicited a particularly and suspiciously enthusiastic reaction from the pop star. Better yet, Swift and Kelce were seen walking out of the game together and rode off in a convertible at the end of the night, with Kelce commenting on the joyride saying they “slid off in the getaway car” on his podcast.
After the media frenzy from this game, Swift outdid herself the next week, traveling to New York to watch the Chiefs play the New York Jets, but this time bringing an entourage of her closest celebrity friends such as Blake Lively, Ryan Reynolds, Sabrina Carpenter, and more.
In an era where Swift is bigger than ever after the massive success of her Eras Tour, the media follows her every move, with the NFL being no exception. Her fame is only continuing to rise leading up to the release of her highly anticipated re-recording of 1989, with Taylor’s Version slated to release on October 27th.
Her relationship with Kelce is particularly interesting because of the media coverage surrounding it. Since 2017 and her recent relationship with Joe Alwyn, Swift has kept to herself and has tried to stay out of the media as much as possible, but the last few months have completely marked a shift in her lifestyle. She has been seen in public constantly over the last few months and that does not seem to be changing anytime soon. It will be interesting to see how her relationship with Kelce plays out as 1989 (Taylor’s Version) releases, and if the two may be the “end game” Swifties have been hoping for throughout Swift’s career