The Kansas City Chiefs are looking to make at least one more Super Bowl run before superstar tight end Travis Kelce calls it a career and retires. Many expected Kelce’s retirement to come following last season’s disappointing campaign that saw the Chiefs miss the playoffs for the first time in the Patrick Mahomes era.
However, the organization knew pretty early that Kelce wouldn’t go out on such poor terms.
“We played our last game of the season in Vegas last year, and when we got back we have player meetings and exit interviews,” Kansas City general manager Brett Veach said during an appearance on the Pat McAfee Show.
“It was a cool deal where Trav came in and he basically said ‘I’m going to take a few weeks off here, but I’m not going out like this, let’s stay in touch and let’s figure something out. . . . We certainly knew ahead of time. While free agency and there was still some questions in the air on whether or not he’d return, we knew basically the day after our last game. He made it known to coach Reid and to me that there was no way he was going out like this.”
Still, Kelce is undoubtedly on the backend of his career, and now revealing that he’s worried about the direction the NFL is heading in, with less games being played on Sundays as the league increases its weekday inventory, even if he may not be in the league himself in the years to come.
“Sunday is the NFL, and everybody sets their week around tuning in to the games happening on Sunday,” Kelce said on his New Heights podcast. “I worry that we’re getting away from that just a little bit by building too much of this.”
Fittingly, the Chiefs open the 2026-27 campaign with a Monday night game on September 14 against the Denver Broncos.
About Qwame Skinner
Qwame Skinner has loved both writing and sports his entire life. In addition to his sports coverage at Comeback Media, Qwame writes novels, and his debut; The First Casualty, an adult fantasy, is out now.