It wasn’t supposed to be like this.
Nine months ago, following Kansas City’s drubbing in Super Bowl LIX at the hands of the Philadelphia Eagles, Travis Kelce broke the news to Pat McAfee that he would be back with the Chiefs for the 2025 season.
“I’m coming back for sure. Gonna try to get into the best shape I’ve been this offseason and get back to the mountaintop,” Kelce told McAfee in a text. "[I’ve] got a real bad taste in my mouth with how I played in that last game and with how I got the guys ready for battle. I can't go out like that!!!!"
The 2025 season was meant to be Kelce’s shot at redemption, an opportunity for him to show he can still be a game-changer on the field and a chance to help his team win another championship.
But even in his worst nightmares, I don’t think Kelce could have imagined a season like this. The goal was to go out with a bang, but instead, it looks like Kelce’s and Kansas City’s seasons will end with a whimper. There is riding off into the sunset, and then there is whatever this is.
History beckoned for the Chiefs and their future Hall of Fame tight end this year. A chance to make a fourth straight Super Bowl and an eighth consecutive AFC Championship game. A chance to build on one of the greatest stretches in NFL history with a fourth Super Bowl title in seven years.
What was meant to be a redemption season for Travis Kelce has instead become a frustrating, injury-filled ending.
Instead, having already been knocked out of playoff contention two weeks before Christmas, the Chiefs are now condemned to finish the season with a losing record for the first time since 2012 after falling to the Tennessee Titans, 26–9, on Sunday.
Superstar quarterback Patrick Mahomes is already set to miss nine months of football with a serious knee injury, and now Gardner Minshew might be out long term too, leaving Chris Oladokun, who had never attempted a pass in a regular-season game before Sunday, as the only healthy quarterback on Kansas City’s roster and practice squad.
I feel bad for Kelce. It wasn’t supposed to end like this.
We could be witnessing the most anticlimactic of endings to a Hall of Fame career that deserves to finish with so much more. Travis Kelce, arguably the greatest tight end of all time, could end his career with three meaningless games catching passes from a third-string quarterback with zero career starts.
The 36-year-old had just one catch for six yards on six targets against the Titans, the fourth-fewest yards he’s ever had during his 215-game career. To be clear, nobody played well for Kansas City—but Kelce looked, at best, unenergetic and, at worst, lazy. It was tough to watch.
Despite all this, Kelce still made history in Tennessee. He became just the second player ever to have 800 receiving yards in 12 consecutive seasons, alongside Hall of Famer Jerry Rice. It’s a special, truly remarkable achievement, but it has been overshadowed by the train wreck that has been the 2025 season. It’s hard to focus on a personal achievement when your team, a Super Bowl contender entering the season, just got steamrolled by a 2–12 team that had the worst record in the NFL last year.
It isn’t fair, but recency bias means Kelce will be remembered for how his career ended—disappointingly, by his standards—and not for everything great that came before it. His success with the Chiefs and meteoric rise to fame because of Taylor Swift means that a not-insignificant chunk of the football world is rooting for his demise simply because they are sick of hearing about him. It’s sad.
This isn’t necessarily the end. Kelce might choose to play on again next year, and honestly, I think he will, and I think he should. But who knows what will happen? Not everything can have a storybook ending. But for Kelce, I think it would be unfair for his legendary career to end in underwhelming mediocrity away from the brightest lights the NFL has to offer.
I feel bad for Kelce. I hope it doesn’t end like this.