Travis Kelce is there and then he isn’t.
He’s the best tight end in the NFL, but he only produces like it once every few weeks. The Kansas City Chiefs star finished Sunday’s win over the Las Vegas Raiders with 10 catches for 90 yards and a touchdown. It was his biggest game of the year (and his first touchdown). But it’s hard to say whether he’ll put up big numbers like that in Week 9 or whether he’ll fade back into the fray.
With a hot-and-cold start, he’s on pace for 92 catches, 813 yards and two touchdowns.
It’s not like the 35-year-old Kelce is a player in decline. But it’s also not like his production is a faucet that he’s turning it on and off as he pleases. Because in that case, he’d probably be producing when the games are tightest. There’s no real correlation between the margin of victory and Kelce’s production. He had just one catch in the Chiefs’ one-point win over the Bengals in Week 2, but put up nine catches for 70 yards in the team’s 13-point win over the Saints in Week 5.
Certainly, he has seen an uptick in production since the injury to receiver Rashee Rice in Week 4. Over the past four games (including the game when Rice hurt his knee), Kelce has averaged nine targets, 7.5 catches and 66.5 yards per game. He is also averaging 3.5 first downs per game.
That’s why I think it’s head coach Andy Reid — not Kelce — who is turning off the faucet of the tight end’s production.
Against the Raiders, Kelce was clearly the offensive focal point. You could see it in the game plan. It was the most designed plays I’d seen the Chiefs run to their tight end all year — with the Saints matchup looking like a close second.
Reid wanted to get the ball to Kelce — including on the tight end’s first touchdown of the year. Patrick Mahomes said as much.
“Without giving away all our secrets, we knew the coverage that they were going to play, and we knew that guy was going to be going over there to get to Travis, and if he went over there enough, we were going to get back to the backside to [DeAndre Hopkins],” Mahomes said. “It was a good play call, and we executed and got a touchdown.”
Mahomes had both Kelce and Hopkins open. But the window was there on his first read: Kelce.
It’s nice to have options, particularly for an offense that has — at times — felt like no one could get open. And that’s weird, because that’s kind of Kelce’s thing. He’s always open. It certainly felt that way in this game, when Kelce pulverized the Raiders’ zone.
Vegas’ game plan for the Chiefs wasn’t unique. The Raiders were in zone for 73.8% of snaps — on the season, the Chiefs have faced zone on 72.4% of snaps. Perhaps Kelce’s importance heightened because Reid is exceedingly familiar with coach Antonio Pierce’s scheme and playcalling. Reid clearly knows how to exploit it, and Kelce was the key cog.
While the presence of Hopkins, who was making his Chiefs debut, might have boosted Kelce’s production in this game, my sense is that — in the long run — Hopkins is in Kansas City to take the load off the team’s tight end.
“I missed [Hopkins] on the one corner route early but still got open,” Mahomes said Sunday after the game. “And as I looked back at the tablet, there was a couple times where in man coverage he was just really working and winning. Even the touchdown to Trav I threw, if you look back on his side, he’s open, too, for a touchdown there.”
Maybe Hopkins is what the Chiefs needed to get Kelce back in gear for the important part of the season. Mahomes, Reid and Kelce have complained about double teams. And if that has been the case, then Hopkins will draw away some of that attention.
That would mean Kelce is back. For good.
Nick Wright: DeAndre Hopkins a ‘valuable addition’ to Chiefs
But there’s also a chance that Kelce will go back to seeing a reduced target share to keep him fresh for the playoffs. Or, at least, he could continue to be a game-plan player, with one big week followed by a lesser one. This is what I figure is the most likely outcome.
The topic of Kelce’s production came up when I was chatting with former Patriots players about the similarities between the New England and Kansas City dynasties, including how both teams made a habit of letting the preseason bleed into the first few weeks of the regular season. If that’s the Chiefs’ mentality, it’s not like they’re going to make heavy usage of Kelce in the “preseason” phase of the regular season.
“I’ll just reference 2018 — no one really expected much out of us. And then all of a sudden the playoffs rolled around and we were a different team,” former Patriots QB Brian Hoyer said. “I remember Gronk [tight end Rob Gronkowksi] just turning it to a different level. He hadn’t been playing that well. And all of a sudden the playoffs rolled around, and Gronk was back to being in [his] second year in the league.”
That 2018 Patriots team had Julian Edelman as its leading pass-catcher with 850 yards. Gronk had two games over 100 yards — but still finished the regular season with only 682 yards. But in the postseason, the Patriots went on a run to win Super Bowl LIII against the Los Angeles Rams. That was the final title that Gronk and Tom Brady brought back to New England. It helped cap off a run of three Super Bowls wins and four Super Bowls appearances over a five-year span.
And that should sound familiar — because, of course, the Chiefs are trying to three-peat.
So perhaps Kelce and the Chiefs have plans for something similar in their pursuit of a three-peat. And for that matter, their plans could extend beyond 2024, with Kelce saying that retirement didn’t even cross his mind this past offseason. He might be trying to save himself for the Super Bowl run, which might also help save him for the year after that.
If that’s the case, the Chiefs will have to keep lifting up Mahomes, who’s on pace to have the worst statistical season of his career, without regular involvement from Kelce.
“That’s what it takes from great football teams. It takes greatness from everybody. It can’t be one guy. That’s what’s made us so great for so long throughout my career. It’s not all about me, it’s not all about Trav,” Mahomes said. “It’s about this entire team, and that’s what makes it so special.”
Prior to joining FOX Sports as an NFL reporter and columnist, Henry McKenna spent seven years covering the Patriots for USA TODAY Sports Media Group and Boston Globe Media. Follow him on Twitter at @henrycmckenna.
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