Travis Kelce reached a new deal with the Kansas City Chiefs that makes him the highest-paid tight end in the NFL. The future Hall of Famer will be in Kansas City for at least two more seasons until his age-36 season.
Chiefs general manager Brett Veach is confident Kelce will continue playing at a high level over the next two years — perhaps even longer.
“Every now and then you have one of these guys that are outliers – and certainly Travis (Kelce) is one of those players,’ Veach said Monday. “It’s funny, it’s not even May yet and today we had a chance to get out there in Phase 2 and guys were out there running around. Travis was the first guy in line, and he looked like he was 28 years old.
“Again, the odds of someone playing this far into their 30s is very low, but it does happen, and it happens with unicorns in the profession, and Travis is one of those.”
Kelce had 93 catches for 984 yards and five touchdowns last season, his lowest yardage total since 2015 and lowest touchdown total since 2019. The nine-time Pro Bowl tight end also was in his age-34 season, making some wondering if Kelce was starting to decline.
The postseason changed that narrative. Kelce finished with 32 catches for 355 yards and three touchdowns as the Chiefs won their third Super Bowl title in five years. This included 11 catches for 116 yards and a touchdown in the AFC Championship game, and nine catches for 93 yards in Super Bowl LVIII.
There’s still some history to be made for Kelce as he climbs up the record books on the all-time tight end list. Kelce has 11,328 receiving yards in his career, just 514 yards away from passing Antonio Gates (11,841) for third all time. Kelce is 3,800 receiving yards away from passing Tony Gonzalez (15,127) for the most receiving yards by a tight end in NFL history.
The Chiefs believe he can get there. Kelce is showing no signs of slowing down.
“We’ll certainly celebrate this with him and hopefully we can ride this thing even longer,” Veach said. “We’ll just have to wait and see, but he’s shown no signs of slowing down. Everyone notices the kind of postseason he had; he just found an extra gear. These special players are always able to find that extra gear and again if anybody can do it, Travis can.”
