Travis Kelce: Engaged and Relaxed

Kansas City and Los Angeles are playing the NFL opener in São Paulo, Brazil on Friday and Travis Kelce was swarmed by fans upon arrival. Pretty sure this isn’t the kind of football that Brazilians mob people over, lol. 

Let’s not pretend that this reaction is for an American football player. He is engaged to Taylor Swift, a global superstar. His status as her fiancé then is also benefiting the league, again, since they are there to expand the popularity of the sport beyond North America. Taylor has become an asset to the NFL – a free asset!

Please don’t take this as disrespect to Travis. I don’t know him, obviously, but I can’t imagine that he would take offence to it because it’s not like he doesn’t know it’s true. That’s part of the appeal since he and Taylor became TNT: that he understands who the main character is, that he’s not out here getting his feelings hurt about it, that he is secure enough in his masculinity to not just accept but also embrace the fact that because she is who she is, people care a lot more about who he is. He said as much during the press conference today. 

I’m still not over how relaxed, how natural he is in this spotlight, with these questions, under this kind of scrutiny. Like, there’s media training and then there’s just instinct. He has great public relations instincts, and it never feels calculated – quite the opposite, actually. Travis seems to always be himself, responding organically to the curiosity about his life and his relationship. He’s smart enough to not reveal too much, but he doesn’t do it coyly, which means he doesn’t get hit with the accusations of being disingenuous. And that complements her energy, given how famous she is and understandably how protective she has to be about what she can and can’t say, Travis’s consistent and irresistible chill is a quality that the public ends up assigning to her by association. This man’s engagement two weeks ago caused a planetary cultural wildfire and here he is, not underplaying it but also not weirded out by it either. As a study in celebrity, he is impressive!