Can Travis Kelce catch up to some of Tony Gonzalez's career numbers?

Last week, the Kansas City Chiefs agreed to a restructured contract for legendary tight end Travis Kelce, giving him a significant pay raise. This new contract makes Kelce the highest paid tight end in the league, which is something I have argued in the past needed to happen.

It also locked Kelce in for the next two years, putting to rest some speculation that he may be considering retirement soon. When the dust settles on this arrangement, Kelce will be finishing up his 14th NFL season, a long time for any player, but especially a tight end.

But will it be enough to get Kelce past Hall of Fame tight end Tony Gonzalez in the conversation for "greatest of all time"? I think it depends on the metrics you use.

In terms of pure yardage, Kelce is currently fourth all time among tight ends at 11,328 yards. However, that's still almost 4,000 yards behind Gonzalez. Even if Travis can average 1000-1100 yards for the next two seasons, he'll still be well short of Tony in that category (but he will likely end up in 2nd place all time).

Similarly, Kelce currently sits tied for fifth all-time in tight end touchdowns at 74. In this case, Gonzales is actually in second place himself, trailing Antonio Gates. I find it hard to believe that Kelce will score 42 touchdowns in the next two seasons, but he could reasonable end up in second or third place.

The truth is, Kelce has had a bit of a strange career. He is undoubtedly great, and a future Hall of Famer, but because of his relatively late start to the NFL, he'll probably never be able to touch the stat records. These last two years probably won't change that (assuming he retires after these two years, which seems highly likely).

Kelce may not be able to break all-time records in the next two years, but he could continue to push two areas that most other tight ends have never accomplished, especially Gonzalez.

The first is 1,000-yard seasons. Kelce already has a ridiculous seven seasons of at least 1,000 yards. Even more ridiculous: he had seven straight seasons of 1,000 yards or more (three more than Tony, and everyone else for that matter) Now that the Chiefs have some good wide receivers, this could open up Kelce to add to his 1,000-yard season count.

The second area is Super Bowl rings. Kelce currently has three rings, which is still one behind the most by a tight end. But it is three more than Gonzalez. I think that regardless of the other stats, getting another ring or two would really catapult Kelce into the GOAT discussion.

For most of Chiefs Kingdom though, Kelce eclipsed Gonzalez a long time ago. This contract extension is just the icing on top. Why? Because it means Kelce will finish his career here, unlike Tony.

The Chiefs teams that Tony played for were vastly different from the ones Kelce plays for (as in, Tony's teams were terrible), so I don't totally blame him for requesting a trade when he did. Nonetheless, his comments regarding his time with the Falcons has continued to leave a bad taste in the mouth of many fans. Kelce isn't in any danger there.

He's a Chiefs lifer. It's also really not a debate. Travis Kelce is the GOAT tight end.