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Adam Teicher
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Travis Kelce ended the 2024 NFL season with profession lows in yards and touchdowns — 823 and three, respectively. He appeared like he is likely to be nearing the top of one of many biggest tight finish careers in NFL historical past. At 35 years outdated, a complicated age for his place, he usually appeared common on the sphere — aside from a classic Kelce stretch of video games throughout the center of the season.
Then he caught seven passes for 117 yards and a landing within the Kansas Metropolis Chiefs‘ divisional playoff win over the Houston Texans, single-handedly dragging an in any other case torpid passing recreation into the AFC Championship Recreation.
“We have all seen it over the previous couple of years,” normal supervisor Brett Veach stated. “There are intervals all through the season the place you are like, ‘This is likely to be it.’ However when the video games are a very powerful and the lights are the brightest, he finds it someplace.”
With Kelce turning 36 in October, the Chiefs anticipate that in 2025 he’ll nonetheless be the participant they know properly.
“The nice ones know the right way to discover it,” Veach stated. “They know the place it is buried, and so they know the right way to entry it. And so they cannot entry it at that age week in and week out, however once they want it, they know the right way to discover it.”
Nonetheless, the Chiefs try to steer themselves away from needing Kelce the best way they’ve in current seasons by planning to shift a few of the receiving burden to others.
At huge receiver, they need to see the return of Rashee Rice, who was main the league in receptions via three video games final 12 months earlier than a Week 4 knee damage ended his season. Additionally they re-signed Hollywood Brown and expect a soar in manufacturing from Xavier Worthy, who caught 59 passes as a rookie final season. At tight finish, the Chiefs even have Noah Grey, who final season set profession highs in catches (40), yards (437) and touchdowns (5).
That does not imply the expectations are minimal for Kelce, who will likely be taking part in beneath the ultimate 12 months of a two-year, $34.25 million contract extension he signed final 12 months.
“I anticipate Travis to be Travis,” quarterback Patrick Mahomes stated. “Clearly, the play on the sphere’s going to be excessive. He’ll go on the market with the mentality that we’re making an attempt to win the Tremendous Bowl this 12 months with us falling brief this final 12 months. Then, I believe greater than something, it is the management that he brings to the constructing each single day. How he leads by instance and the way he leads vocally, it is a big effect on our soccer group, so I anticipate him to play at a excessive degree after which be a good higher chief.
“From what I’ve seen … he is able to go. He is been placing within the work this offseason, and he is excited for an additional probability to make a run at it.”
Kelce has all the time performed a excessive proportion of the snaps for the Chiefs, and final 12 months was no totally different. The truth is, he performed extra snaps (950) and was within the lineup for the next proportion of the Chiefs’ offensive performs (81.8%) than in any season since 2019.
Chiefs coach Andy Reid indicated he is unlikely to alter plans for Kelce, saying he is “probably not feeling” the necessity to reduce on Kelce’s taking part in time.
“It will be just like final 12 months,” Reid stated. “… He is in nice form proper now, so I believe he is wanting ahead to getting going.
“I all the time watch him. I all the time control him. I do know he is getting older. He does not know he is getting older, however I do. I will be the unhealthy man in some instances there, if wanted. If I believe it is catching as much as him somewhat bit, I am going to pull off and put him the place he must be. Apart from that, he hasn’t confirmed me any of that but. He is carried out rather well with it.”
Kelce took a while after the Chiefs’ Tremendous Bowl LIX loss to the Philadelphia Eagles to resolve whether or not he needed to play one other season, his twelfth within the NFL. However he made his choice in comparatively brief order and stated it wasn’t a troublesome selection and that he had extra good soccer in him.
He indicated he needed to place himself via what he known as a extra rigorous offseason exercise schedule than final 12 months.
“That call for me must be made again in March or early April,” Kelce stated. “You set the tone and put a routine collectively that will get your mindset and will get your physique [right] and actually from there you can begin to tweak your talent set. So it is simply every thing concerned. You need to evolve each single 12 months in all phases of the sport. So that you already know that began again in March and to date we’re on monitor.”
Even when his different numbers weren’t as much as Kelce’s commonplace final 12 months, he nonetheless caught 97 passes, tied for the fourth-highest whole of his profession. He nonetheless ranked fifth in yardage amongst tight ends, behind Brock Bowers, Trey McBride, George Kittle and Jonnu Smith. However that occurred throughout a season when Rice and Brown performed in solely a small fraction of the video games.
In the event that they keep wholesome, together with Worthy and Grey, Kelce’s streak of main the Chiefs in catches and yards will doubtless come to an finish at three. That would not essentially imply the Chiefs take a look at his season as a disappointment.
“His numbers will not be the identical,” Veach stated. “You need to acknowledge … that he is older. He is not 28 years outdated. However every thing runs extra effectively when that man is on the market. He is nonetheless going to demand the eye or not less than the occasional eyes of main defenders simply due to his title and his legacy.
“Having Travis on the sphere makes us higher. I do not know if I take a look at it when it comes to expectations for yardage or touchdowns or catches. When he is on the sphere, he makes us higher. He is additionally a man who makes the individuals round him higher.”
