Rumors About Taylor Swift And Travis Kelce's Relationship

We know Taylor Swift has done far greater things than dating the boy on the football team, but by romancing Travis Kelce and giving Swifties an excuse to infiltrate the NFL, she's undeniably injected some exciting new life into the incessant chatter about her love life. Sure, there's been the inevitable grousing about overexposure, but the unlikely pairing of the pop star who loves a good turn of phrase and the top fantasy football tight end has reminded us of the things that unite us: screaming in a stadium and indulging in juicy gossip about the rich, famous, and physically gifted.

We knew Traylor was going to be fun to follow from the start. An early conspiracy theory about the couple has cast Swift as a mastermind who cared far more about the Philadelphia Eagles than we realized. In a viral TikTok video, one fan suggested that Swift was scheming like a criminal to date Travis, with her end game being to ghost him right before the Super Bowl. In this scenario, we get a repeat of the "Kelce Bowl," which saw Travis and the Kansas City Chiefs defeat the Eagles, the team Travis' older brother, Jason Kelce, happens to play on. But this time, Travis would play poorly and cause his team to lose. (Now that really is better than revenge.)

Rumors and conspiracy theories about Traylor from the outlandish to the mundane "Everything is going great!" variety keep cropping up, and we're kind of hoping that they never go out of style.

Before she and Travis Kelce got together, Taylor Swift became the female artist with the most No. 1 albums. Kelce also proved that he was at the top of his game by winning two Super Bowls, hosting "Saturday Night Live," and appearing in myriad commercials. Still, some skeptics were convinced that Traylor was desperate for even more good publicity. USA Today writer Mike Freeman penned a tongue-in-cheek opinion piece in early October 2023, suggesting that the couple's relationship was a "marketing ploy" but assured readers that it was okay to get totally enchanted by the deception. Other outlets went even further with this angle; NPR's "It's Been a Minute" consulted PR expert Molly McPherson, who deemed Traylor "a successful public relations relationship" after the NFL seemingly built a marketing strategy around them.

Fueling the rumors and speculation was the timing of the "Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour" movie premiere. Keeping up with all things Traylor hadn't lost its novelty when it hit theaters in mid-October, and commercials for the film aired during Sunday Night Football. As for Kelce, he previously told Vanity Fair that he wanted to get his "face out from under the helmet," which he officially accomplished by stepping out with Swift.

After Swift attended her first Chiefs game that September, a source told People she and Kelce were "just hanging out" and having a good time. Cynics on X suggested that Swift's cheering didn't look genuine during that outing, but people throw rocks at things that shine, right?

When Killa Trav left Arrowhead Stadium with Taylor Swift for the first time, he was dressed to kill in KidSuper's 1989 Bedroom Painting Set. Outlets including Cosmopolitan theorized that Travis Kelce did some online shopping to find a 'fit that would be a nod to the album Swift was about to drop, "1989 (Taylor's Version)." But on X, KidSuper confessed that the "1989" was added to the name of the denim jacket and pants combo after Kelce was photographed wearing them. So, unless the splashes of blue reminded him of Swift singing about getting painted blue by a "twin flame bruise" in "All Too Well (10 Minute Version)," he probably didn't have Swift in mind when he purchased the ensemble. The name change was a brilliant marketing strategy on the brand's part, but a big disappointment for Swifties who love finding Easter eggs about their idol's love life.

Speaking of Swifties, they noticed that a pair of brown crushed velvet pants Kelce was pictured wearing on Instagram in early October 2023 bore a striking resemblance to the curtains in Swift's "Midnights Mayhem with Me" TikTok series. "You look so good in Taylor's curtains babe," read one response to his Instagram post. When Us Weekly asked Kelce's stylist, Danielle Salzedo, about the pants possibly being a nod to Swift's soft and shiny decor, she couldn't say whether or not this theory was correct. "However, when people authentically connect, they start to have those serendipitous coincidences," she said.

While Taylor Swift has attended multiple Kansas City Chiefs games, there was a wild theory about why she made sure she didn't miss one in particular: the team's October 1, 2023 matchup against the New York Jets. On X, a business consultant named Brittany Muller suggested that Swift's goal was to manipulate Google search results so that what comes up first when someone types "Taylor Swift's jets" isn't negative articles about her private jet usage, but page after page of pieces about her attendance at the game. "If it's just a wild coincidence, it's a wild coincidence, but it could also be one of the most calculated PR stunts of all time," Muller told Wired.

In July 2022, a rep for Swift did have to defend the substantial size of her private jets' carbon footprint. There were a lot of negative comments about the matter being posted on social media at the time because the digital marketing agency Yard had named Swift as the celebrity who was producing the most CO2 emissions. While addressing the reported 170 flights that the singer's pair of private planes made over a span of 200 days, the rep told BuzzFeed News, "Taylor's jet is loaned out regularly to other individuals. To attribute most or all of these trips to her is blatantly incorrect." So, at least she's generous with her pollution producers.

In September 2023, a TikTok user named Molly claimed that Taylor Swift had gone to great lengths to enjoy a little privacy while dining with Travis Kelce in an unnamed Kansas City restaurant. Molly explained that she gained this information from a friend who was purportedly at the restaurant when Kelce and Swift showed up. "[Swift] just paid for everybody at the restaurant so that they would leave," she said. However, Molly later deleted that video and uploaded a new one to clarify what had allegedly happened. According to Molly's sources, the couple didn't just show up out of the blue but had called ahead to reserve the entire rooftop of the establishment. "The people who were still there when their reservation was coming up had their meals paid for by Taylor," she added. Another source identified the restaurant as Prime Social Rooftop and claimed to ET that it was Kelce who paid for the reservation.

Apparently, some diners were lucky enough to catch a glimpse of the couple on that occasion, but this wasn't the case when Swifties numbering in the hundreds flocked to the Elm, a restaurant located in New Canaan, Connecticut, that October. According to the Daily Voice, fans believed that Traylor was dining there with Ryan Reynolds and Blake Lively. "I think a 'Mom' started the rumor and then it just went crazy," the restaurant's manager said. The crowd that gathered there was so large that it apparently had to be dispersed by police and firefighters.

When Sunday Night Football became all about Taylor Swift, some X users were convinced that Patrick Mahomes' wife, Brittany Mahomes, was not going to be happy about a new WAG becoming the center of attention. One person predicted that Brittany would go all Regina George on Swift — but instead, Brittany's haters had to watch in horror as the two women happily hugged, gabbed, and danced together. They even showed off a tricky celebratory handshake during an October 2023 Kansas City Chiefs game.

According to some sources, the unexpected camaraderie between the quarterback's wife and the 12-time Grammy winner is not something that only exists when they know that cameras are around. Swift's boyfriend and Brittany's hubby are close pals, so it was a smart move on the singer's part to befriend Kansas City's top WAG. TMZ reported that they became texting buddies after their first experience sharing a skybox, and during an afterparty, they were purportedly spotted doing shots with each other. (Maybe they did a toast to real friends.) 

An insider who spoke to Us Weekly also dispelled the speculation that Brittany was jealous of Swift. "Brittany is thrilled to be building a genuine friendship with Taylor," the source said. "They've hung out a couple of times and have grown fairly close in a short period of time. Brittany thinks Taylor is so sweet, and down to earth, and they get along really great." It's nice to have a friend.

We've seen evidence that Taylor Swift gets along with Travis Kelce's mom on our TV screens. During her first Kansas City Chiefs game, Swift was filmed sharing a hearty laugh with Donna Kelce while touching her arm as if they were old friends. And is that a friendship bracelet we spy on Donna's wrist in this October 2023 Instagram pic? Her close proximity to Traylor soon made Donna a popular subject of rumors, as fans obviously wanted to know if she approved of the new woman in her son's life. 

"Donna likes Taylor and thinks she's very sweet and down to earth," one source told People. However, another insider claimed that Donna had some qualms about the way the couple's courtship was progressing. "Donna isn't against Taylor dating Travis," the source said, as reported by Marca. "She just wants her to pump the brakes a bit. Donna thinks that their relationship should develop naturally, out of the spotlight." 

As for what Donna herself has said about Swift, she shared that she isn't comfortable talking about her sons' personal lives during an October 6, 2023 interview with "Today." However, co-hosts Hoda Kotb and Savannah Guthrie did get her to reveal that she wasn't certain how serious her son and Swift were at that time. She also didn't seem as enthusiastic about spending time with Swift as she did on TV. Of what hanging out with the pop star was like, she said, "It was okay." Though that may have been more due to the continued line of questioning surrounding Traylor.

When an NFL player who is six-foot-five and weighs 250 pounds goes out in public, there are always going to be jokes about security guards being superfluous. But some Swifties were convinced that Travis Kelce actually tried to temporarily fill in for one of Taylor Swift's security guards when the couple attended a "Saturday Night Live" afterparty in New York City in mid-October 2023. One viral video on TikTok claimed that it showed Travis pushing a member of Swift's security detail out of the way so he could be the one to open her car door. But all Travis really did was squeeze behind the security guard as he moved away from the vehicle. ET also published a report that was seemingly about that interaction, quoting a source as saying, "At one point, he actually told her security guard that he could step aside, like he'd take it from here."

Travis explained what actually happened on "New Heights" a few days later. But first, Jason Kelce had a good giggle over a TikTok video imagining what would be said in a conversation between Swift's security team and Travis. (In summation, he'd be warned against taking matters into his own hands.) "I didn't push him," Travis said. "I placed my hand on the gentleman's back to let him know I was behind him. If I would have pushed him, he probably would have turned around and tased me." That's one way to give Swift that electric touch she's been longing for.