Kansas City Chiefs head coach Andy Reid and tight end Travis Kelce have each commented on a viral movement from Sunday’s Super Bowl in which the latter was seen yelling at and putting his hands on the former in a fit of rage.
The Chiefs’ offense struggled for much of the game in Las Vegas, but quarterback Patrick Mahomes threw a touchdown pass to Mecole Hardman in the final seconds of overtime to win it.
Kansas City defeated San Francisco 25-22 to claim its second title in back-to-back seasons and its third in the last five years.
But after Chiefs running back Isiah Pacheco lost a red zone fumble in the second quarter, a heated Kelce approached Reid screaming and put his hands on him in a moment that caught fire online:
Travis Kelce looked less than enthused pic.twitter.com/yncKhjtNl4
— NFL on CBS 🏈 (@NFLonCBS) February 12, 2024
Yo Travis Kelce – we don’t care if you are dating Taylor Swift… this isn’t cool. You don’t yell at coach Andy Reid #SuperBowl pic.twitter.com/ani8fZoR2k
— Andy Signore (@andysignore) February 12, 2024
Should Travis Kelce be benched for shoving coach Andy Reid? pic.twitter.com/ny0bWWRS3X
— MLFootball (@_MLFootball) February 12, 2024
Insane behavior with your head coach pic.twitter.com/gquNagYUdL
— Will Compton (@_willcompton) February 12, 2024
Has Travis Kelce been arrested for assaulting Andy Reid yet? pic.twitter.com/ClIIUrozEi
— Vince Langman (@LangmanVince) February 12, 2024
Kelce tripping bumping coach like that. If that would’ve been somebody else the announcers would be dogging that player out!
— Bernard Pollard Jr (@Crushboy31) February 12, 2024
Travis Kelce just ran up on one of the greatest coaches in NFL history and shoved him during the Super Bowl. I think that’s a story that Jim and Tony have to address. This is wild.
— Jason Whitlock (@WhitlockJason) February 12, 2024
Reid talked about the incident during his postgame news conference.
“He caught me off balance,” the 65-year-old coach said of Kelce. “I wasn’t watching. Cheap shot, but that’s all right.”
“He was really coming over [and saying], ‘Just put me in, I’ll score. I’ll score.’ So, that’s really what it was. Well, I love that. It’s not the first time. Listen, I appreciate him,” he said.
“The part I love is he loves to play the game and he wants to help his team win,” Reid added, according to ESPN. “It’s not a selfish thing. That’s not what it is. I understand that.
“As much as he bumps into me, I get after him and we understand that. He just caught me off balance.”
Kelce also spoke to the media and said he was not advocating for more targets from quarterback Patrick Mahomes and that he was just sharing his love for the game with Reid.
“I didn’t care about my catches,” he said. “I just wanted to — I wanted the score to be different. … Coach has asked us to speak our minds and I just wanted to let him know how much passion I had for this team.”
Should Travis Kelce be punished for his sideline behavior?
Kelce added that Reid is “one of the best leaders of men I’ve ever seen in my life. And he’s helped me a lot with that, with channeling that emotion, with channeling that passion. I owe my entire career to that guy and being able to kind of control how emotional I get, and I just love him.”
There was talk that Reid and Kelce might retire if they won the Super Bowl, but both men committed to returning to the team next season.
