Y’all know I do NOT follow football whatsoever. I’m just missing the football gene. But I do follow tennis, and I am well-versed in conversations about generational athletes who start missing a step as they get older. Those conversations happened around Serena Williams, Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and now Novak Djokovic (the youngest out of that grouping). You can train, you can change your game, you can fight like hell, but you can’t outrun Father Time. Smart athletes adapt, and they acknowledge that they are no longer at their physical peak, but they can still get the job done. That’s where Travis Kelce seems to be just days shy of his 35th birthday – a generational talent, a future Hall of Famer, but he’s missing a step. Apparently, football bros are really mad about Travis’s performance in the first three Chiefs games of the season, and they’re blaming Travis’s slow start on his fun, Taylor Swift-centric off-season. While that might be a factor, I guarantee that his age is an even bigger factor.
Travis Kelce’s slow start to the 2024 season continues to dominate sports media talk following his third straight underwhelming performance, a 30-yard, four-reception outing in Sunday night’s 22-17 win over the Falcons. While NBC’s Cris Collinsworth called out the lack of “magic” between Kelce and star Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes, former ESPN personality Todd McShay zoned in on other elements surrounding the All-Pro tight end’s highly publicized life.
“Every show I watch, every pregame show, halftime show, postgame show, weekday show, every broadcast I watch for the last few weeks, it’s like are we not allowed to say that he’s out of shape, that he’s been partying all offseason? He’s been jet-setting around with the most famous person probably in the entire world, that’s he drinking, going to the U.S. Open,” McShay said Monday on “The Ryen Russillo Podcast,” referencing Kelce and girlfriend Taylor Swift’s escapades earlier this month.
“… What I do know is, I want you to take a picture from preseason 2022 and then take a picture preseason 2024, they’re barely the same human being, Ryen, and everyone’s like, ‘We got to get him the ball, why isn’t he part of the offense?’ The defense is double-covering.’ Here’s the thing, bottom line with Kelce: The coverage and the respect he gets is the same, the athlete is not. Now, is he going to work himself into shape during the season? Yeah, I’m sure he will. He’s an unbelievable competitor, he’s one of the best to ever do it and he still finds a way to make a play or two here and there and shows up in some clutch moments, but he’s not the same guy right now.”
Kelce, now in his 12th NFL season with the Chiefs, has tallied eight receptions for 69 yards and zero touchdowns to open the year — one season after he failed to amass 1,000 total yards for the first time since 2015. Although the three-time Super Bowl champ recently expressed that he stopped getting caught up with stats long ago, McShay pondered why some are dancing around certain critiques.
“I don’t see the same explosiveness, I see him wearing down a little bit in games, it’s okay, he’ll work himself back into shape, it’s not the first guy ever whose not quite in the elite shape that he was,” said McShay, who is nearing a deal to join The Ringer full-time after being laid off by ESPN last year. “And you’re sitting here and you’re defending him, too. Is there some kind of message I’m not getting from the league that you’re not allowed to say he’s not in the same shape, he’s not able to produce at the highest level right now? And he’ll probably work himself back into shape by Week 8, 9, 10 this season. Are we not allowed to say that?”
As McShay called attention to Kelce’s off-field endeavors, he added, “You can’t be doing all of those things and still be the same person physically as you were in 2022.… I’m not blaming it on Taylor Swift, I’m not blaming anything, all I’m saying is when you win two Super Bowls, you got that whole tour that happens after the Super Bowl, he’s the most commercialized guy, there’s no one else doing more commercials I don’t think in the league, he and Mahomes are up there, I think Kelce’s doing more commercials and things, he’s been at more events, doing more things socially. It’s impossible to carry that schedule and still put in the same amount of time for football,” McShay said.
My question to the football fans: is it looked down upon for football players to do whatever the hell they want during their off-season? I would assume a lot of players roll up to training camp out-of-shape, with the understanding that they will train and play their way into shape. I would assume that’s what Travis thought he was doing too, and then he got to training camp and nothing snapped back into place. Because he’s in his mid-30s and it gets harder and harder to do that. Anyway, Travis can do whatever the hell he wants and I’m sure he’ll get better throughout the season (the Chiefs still won all three of the games they’ve played this season). It also seems like Travis knows that he’s looking at the final year (or final years) of his playing career and he’s already worked out an extensive post-football career path.
Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Backgrid, Cover images.