KANSAS CITY, MO — About 80,000 fans are expected to fill Arrowhead Stadium to watch the defending Super Bowl champion Kansas City Chiefs take on the Baltimore Ravens in a rematch of the AFC Championship game Thursday night that is expected to kick off the NFL season.
Many people will be watching Taylor Swift make an appearance in one of the stadium’s suites.
The pop superstar became one of the Chiefs’ biggest fans last season when she began a high-profile romance with tight end Travis Kelce. After he failed to pass her a friendship bracelet at one of her concerts, Kelce took to social media to invite Swift to a game, and the “Anti-Hero” singer showed up for a game against the Bears in September.
They continued to meet up throughout the season whenever Swift took a break from her Eras Tour. The 14-time Grammy winner hopped from a stadium show in Japan to Las Vegas for the Super Bowl, where she partied with friends like Blake Lively, enjoyed a performance of Post Malone’s “America the Beautiful,” appeared to win a beer-drinking contest, and then celebrated the Chiefs’ victory by locking lips with Kelce on the field.
Along the way, Swift became close friends with Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes and his wife Brittany.
During the offseason, Kelsey made frequent stops on the Eras Tour, even making brief onstage appearances. Swift later said in a social media post that she was still “smiling/ecstatic” at Kelsey’s Eras Tour debut in front of 90,000 screaming fans at London’s Wembley Stadium, and that she “will never forget those shows.”
In fact, both superstars had busy offseasons.
Swift recently wrapped up her European leg of the Eras Tour with five shows at Wembley Stadium, and will then take a break until October before embarking on a North American tour that will take in the U.S. and Canada through December.
Kelsey and his brother, retired Eagles center Jason Kelsey, recently signed a nine-figure deal to host the “New Heights” podcast on Amazon’s Wondery. He’s also set to star in Ryan Murphy’s murder mystery “Grotesquerie,” premiering on FX on Sept. 25, and host “Are You Smarter Than a Celebrity” on Prime Video, premiering Oct. 16.
And then there’s the fact that the Chiefs, who have won two consecutive Super Bowls and three in the past five years, are chasing history starting Thursday night. No team has ever won the Lombardi Trophy three times in a row.
Asked this week how he manages it all, Kelsey cited Arrowhead Stadium, up the hill from the Chiefs’ practice facility and parking lot, as his sanctuary, where he spends time with his closest friends.
“I really enjoy football and the way it takes me out of my life,” he explained. “And football gives me something to be really happy about. I enjoy coming into the building and working on my skills, figuring out new game plans and perfecting them for the people around me. It gives me purpose in my day and my life. I get really excited about doing it.”
But it hasn’t been all smooth sailing for Swift and Kelce this offseason.
Last month, Swift canceled three sold-out shows in Vienna after the CIA discovered information that several men had been arrested with ties to the Islamic State. “They were plotting to kill tens of thousands of people who attended this concert, including, I’m sure, many Americans,” said David Cohen, the agency’s deputy director. “And we’ve made significant progress on that.”
Then on Thursday, Kelce’s rep slammed a recently published online document questioning the authenticity of their relationship as “completely false and fabricated.” The document, titled “Travis Kelce’s Comprehensive Media Plan for His Relationship Following His Breakup with Taylor Swift,” was posted to Reddit but has since been removed.
This article was published around the same time that Kelsey appeared on “The Rich Eisen Show” to discuss their relationship.
“She was very open to learning the game,” Kells said. “What makes her great at her job is that she’s very detail-oriented in everything from the lyrics to the music, even the releases and the music videos. She’s very detail-oriented and part of it, so I think she was curious about the job.”
Kelsey said Swift started drawing up some plays for him, but he smiled and said, “She’s a little biased and just makes plays for me. So let’s see if they can come to director (Andy) Reed’s office.”
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