Taylor Swift, Travis Kelce and a monoculture yearning for romance (2024)

The sight of the planet’s most famous pop star jumping and yelling “LET’S F---ING GO” as one of the NFL’s most talented and charismatic players scores a touchdown would cause a commotion if we were living in normal times. But it’s 2023, so this budding romance story has consumed every corner of the internet, sports media, non-sports media, sports betting apps, cable-news segments, memes and text messages from dads to daughters asking, “Have you seen this?” During the Sept. 24 game, Fox announcers gleefully dubbed the Swift-Kelce pairing as “the romance that we all need. It feels like it’s right for America.”

On Sunday, NBC just as eagerly panned to Swift watching the game in a suite with a slew of celebrity friends, including Blake Lively, Ryan Reynolds, Sophie Turner, Sabrina Carpenter, Antoni Porowski and Hugh Jackman. Swift spent time during the first half talking with Brittany Mahomes, wife of Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes, and shared a hug with Kelce’s mom, Donna. When the Chiefs — not even Kelce — scored a touchdown, the producers raced to catch Swift’s elated celebration.

At one point, commentator Cris Collinsworth dreamily recalled how Swift and Kelce left Arrowhead Stadium together Sept. 24 in Kelce’s convertible, saying “it had to be the most freeing thing that Taylor Swift has done in 20 years.” His fellow announcer Mike Tirico told viewers that they had originally planned to talk more about Swift’s music, until the Jets made a comeback and tied the score at 20-20. “Sorry, Taylor,” he said. “A game broke out in front of us.”

Ah, yes — technically, football was the reason that fans packed into MetLife Stadium, and for the majority, that was the priority. Yet Swift’s presence loomed, and not just in the spike in ticket sales midweek after news outlets reported that she would be at the game. Songs blasted out of speakers during parking lot tailgates; fans wore Eras Tour T-shirts; and Swifties spotted one another in the crowd and traded friendship bracelets, a concert tradition, and scanned the stadium with binoculars so they could get a better view of Swift in the VIP suite.

When Leila Pari was announced as the national anthem singer, someone yelled, “WHY NOT TAYLOR SWIFT?” When Kelce caught a pass, there was a chorus of, “Yeah, Taylor!” When the “Celebrity Spotlight” segment appeared on the jumbotron and highlighted stars in attendance (Jeremy Strong, J.B. Smoove, Carson Daly, Walker Hayes, Ray Romano, Sylvester Stallone’s daughters) and didn’t include Swift, there was a noticeable murmur in the crowd. Granted, she was actively rooting against the home team, but Swift’s sheer level of fame tends to transcend party lines.

On a deeper level, the seismic reaction might not really even be about Swift and Kelce, who, according to anonymous tabloid sources, are merely in the “super, super early days” of hanging out. Maybe the way this pairing gripped the nation and rose instantly to Brangelina and Bennifer status (“Swiftce?”) says more about us as a society, and our desire to leave behind the sorry state of the world and admire the cultural explosion that occurs when you bring together two rabid fan bases.

“Intellectually, it feels right. If you told me that the two largest bastions of monoculture in America — Taylor Swift and professional football — were going to collide, I would tell you the result would be massive,” said Nora Princiotti, who covers the NFL for the Ringer and co-hosts a podcast, “Every Single Album,” where she and former Ticketmaster chief executive Nathan Hubbard analyze Swift’s career and discography, as well as the work of other artists. “But that doesn’t stop it from feeling surreal when you actually experience how widespread this is.”

The NFL, not known for being very playful where matters of romance and hotness and its professional athletes are concerned (but recently loosening up when TikTok nursed an obsession for Cincinnati Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow), has happily embraced the ecstatic news cycle and briefly changed its X bio to read “NFL (Taylor’s Version),” a reference to the albums she has rerecorded as a means to own her masters. Even the Empire State Building’s social media team joked about the building lighting up in red and white to symbolize Swift being photographed at the Chiefs-Bears game next to a plate of chicken, ketchup and “seemingly ranch,” a super-viral meme that Heinz quickly capitalized on with a new condiment.

Swift’s publicist did not return a request for comment about the madness; Kelce recently joked about all the attention on his podcast, but said he would not be sharing details about his personal life.

This is all unhinged, but such fervor isn’t surprising when it comes to Swift, who spent this year boosting the U.S. economy as she performed 3½-hour concerts to sold-out stadiums of 70,000-plus, not counting the thousands of fans singing along outside in the parking lots after thwarted attempts to score tickets. The frenzy surrounding the Eras Tour — which goes international this year and next, on pace to become the first tour in history to make $1 billion — was a wake-up call to anyone who ever doubted her vast influence, which is now often compared to Beatlemania, with sparkles and friendship bracelets.

But even with her Swiftian ability to dominate the spotlight — which will magnify when the Eras Tour concert film hits theaters Oct. 13 and “1989 (Taylor’s Version)” drops at the end of the month — no one can deny the bro-tastic power of Kelce.

Many Swift fans joked on social media that they had no idea who this man was (“‘Tight end’ is a real position in American football? For serious?” one observer asked), and TikTok is getting a lot of mileage from prank videos of Swifties informing the men in their lives that Swift is going to make this Travis Kelce person famous. (The reactions from the men — the pained sputtering, the indignation — makes the whole frenzy worth it.)

In reality, Kelce has long been carefully crafting an NFL-adjacent career as a celebrity: red-carpet appearances, awards shows, glossy magazine photo shoots, star of his own short-lived E! dating show in 2016, “Catching Kelce.” He’s a certified NFL heartthrob on TikTok. Earlier this year, he hosted “Saturday Night Live,” where his most viral sketch was an infomercial where he starred as the classic “Straight Male Friend.”

“He’s a supreme athletic talent; he’s a very attractive man; he’s also personable and funny. Combine those three, he’s going to be more famous than he should be,” said Jack Parodi, a content creator for sports entertainment company the Game Day. He called the Swift-Kelce pairing “probably the biggest thing to happen to the NFL regular season in a long time.”

This certainly held true for some Jets fans, demoralized in the first game of the season when new star quarterback Aaron Rodgers instantly suffered a season-ending injury. Frank Giantomasi, 38, a Jets season ticket holder from Hoboken, noted that things are looking “pretty dire” this year, so he was glad he could inject some excitement by showing up wearing his bright pink “I Heart Taylor” T-shirt that his sister bought him when she attended the Eras Tour at MetLife in May.

“I thought I would never have a chance to wear it. … It’s a good shirt, right?” he said, and he seemed pleased that Swift might inspire more people to show up on Sunday. “I’ve been to a lot of half-empty games.”

The stadium was also dotted with red jerseys as Chiefs fans swarmed in. Some were amused by the extreme attention that Kelce has received recently, though they’re used to him being in the news. Two Chiefs fans, Mike and Sam from Connecticut, withheld their last names as Sam bravely admitted that she’s “not really a Taylor Swift fan, I’ve got to be honest with you,” and was concerned that all the headlines might be distracting. “We just want the Chiefs to win,” she said. “So as long as he’s focused on the game, you know — whatever.”

Since Swift’s appearance in the Chiefs suite, Kelce gained around 900,000 followers on Instagram, for a total of 3.7 million. Sales of his jersey rose about 400 percent. Kelce has been luring new fans since the lead-up to the 2023 Super Bowl, where he played against his brother, Philadelphia Eagles center Jason Kelce. Coverage of the “Kelce Bowl” sparked adorable viral clips (in one, Jason sobbed into his mother’s arms after the Chiefs won the game and said she should “go celebrate with Trav”) as well as more attention on the Kelces’ podcast, “New Heights,” where they discuss football and make fun of each other as only brothers do. Trav, of course, stole a few scenes in his brother’s recent Prime Video documentary, “Kelce.”

“This is gasoline thrown on a fire, his fan base with her fan base,” said “Sunday Night Football” coordinating producer Rob Hyland, whose workweek suddenly got a lot more interesting when everyone realized that Swift might show up and drive an enormous amount of attention to the Chiefs-Jets broadcast. The last time a Sunday night telecast got this much hype might have been in 2021 with Tom Brady’s first game against the New England Patriots after having joined the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, he said.

Hyland said the crew spent the week preparing as though Swift would be at the game: A promo featured her song “Welcome to New York,” and Daly, host of “The Voice,” appeared in a pretaped bit where he taught Swifties about football, using plenty of lyric puns. Such a storyline was ideal for “Sunday Night Football,” Hyland said, which likes to feature “make you smile” moments alongside the game to entice new viewers. It’s part of what he calls the “NBC Sports storytelling DNA,” familiar to anyone who has watched the network’s Olympics coverage, which showcases an athlete’s family, friends and personal history.

“It’s already a great scene to see Travis Kelce’s mom, Donna,” Hyland said. “Add Taylor Swift to that image, and you’ve got TV magic.”

Despite Travis Kelce’s hotheaded reputation on the field — getting penalties and fines, punching a teammate during training camp — many football fans relate to him as an intense competitor who also enjoys chugging beer and taking shots in the middle of his team’s Super Bowl parade. “They see him as a dude you would love to be friends with,” Parodi said.

In that sense, the Kelce and Swift fan bases have much in common: Swift has built her 17-year career on treating her listeners like close friends. They feel as if she knows them, and they know her. And after six years of her very private relationship with British actor Joe Alwyn (with whom she split earlier this year), they are thrilled to simply see her out in public.

Kelsey Moore, 26, of New York couldn’t get tickets to the Eras Tour at MetLife earlier this year — so when her boyfriend saw the news on Bleacher Report that Swift was going to be at the game Sunday, she raced to buy tickets before the prices inevitably soared.

“My guess is she’s relishing being back in the limelight,” Moore said. “And as a fan, I’m relishing all the content we’re getting after the pandemic, when we weren’t getting to see her.”

It didn’t matter that she was sitting in the 300-level seats, nowhere near the superstar’s suite. The whole experience was worth it, she said, especially the feeling of being part of a community with other Swift fans in attendance: “The experience of exchanging friendship bracelets with young women and middle-aged men alike was oddly affirming and beautiful.”

Kelce immediately endeared himself to the Swift fan base when he raved on a podcast this summer about attending the Eras Tour and how he hoped to give the singer his phone number on a friendship bracelet, which is how all of this started. The fact that he knew about the bracelets was one thing, but he clearly knows her work, name-checking a fan-favorite song as he joked about how they raced off in a “Getaway Car” after the game last week.

“The thing that is sort of funny for me is to watch as he is presenting himself as a fan of hers,” said Princiotti, the Ringer reporter and podcast host. “He’s been on his podcast talking about her the same way Swifties talk about her.”

This could also be why the NFL is so excited to play along. The success of the Eras Tour, attended by people of all ages, including celebrities and football players, helped combat the tired idea that Swift’s music is “just for teenage girls,” and instead cemented her as a once-in-a-generation pop star. It’s a positive story about the NFL, which has had its share of bad press, and it’s no surprise that any entity would want to claim Swift as one of its own.

There’s no telling where it leads, the combined capital and star-wattage almost too bright, but guaranteed to command attention for as long as they want us to keep watching. In that sense, a good nickname for the pair might be one that others have floated on social media: “TnT,” a fitting portmanteau for a story that just keeps exploding.