Hello, Swifties. Welcome to the National Football League. The NFL.
I’m not – for some of you older folks – not talking about fans of literary agent Swifty Lazar. I’m also not talking about the term when it’s used to describe someone who’s a con artist, or a thief.
I’m sharing thoughts with the huge fan base of mega pop star Taylor Swift, who is now the romantic interest of Kansas City Chiefs tight end, Travis Kelce.
It would be a sweeping generalization to approach this morning’s thoughts believing none of you Swifties were ever professional football fans. However, with your statuesque goddess now dating Kelce, for those who haven’t paid much attention to the NFL, she’s going to be at several Chiefs games and her reactions throughout the game will be fodder for camera operators stationed all over the stadium.
Swift is a beautiful 5’11” winner of many Grammys who also displays impressive comic timing when she makes cameo appearances on shows like Saturday Night Live. Her followers are guaranteed that a few of her songs will contain lyrics about her numerous terminated romantic relationships.
Famous men (actors, produces, musicians, etc.) have broken up with Taylor Swift, but she gets the last word when it’s time for her next album.
Swift also writes about underdogs getting their time in the sun. Perhaps some of you Bears, Browns, Texans, and Commanders fans will get glimmers of hope your team will have it’s time to shine in a league where the adjusted schedule each year, the draft system and free agency arguably allow teams to move from worst to first more than any other professional sport.
I digress.
I promised to give those of you who are unfamiliar with the game a condensed guide to professional football.
First, football is a beautiful combination of grace and violence, especially at its highest level: professional football.
These guys frequently end most of their plays in high-speed collisions, but don’t worry because “it only hurts this much right now.” In fact, most of these athletes are in such good condition, they get right back up and prepare for the next play.
When the score is tied at the end of a game, Travis Kelce’s quarterback, Patrick Mahomes, is the guy who throws the ball to him because most of the time he has a great deal of success catching it.
Mahomes counts on Kelce for many of his last-minute heroics, but football requires every player on the field to “drop everything now” when the game is on the line in order for their plan to be executed successfully.
If Kelce’s team, the Kansas City Chiefs, loses a game, and he speaks afterward at a press conference he “might be okay” because he knows he must get ready for next week’s game, “but he’s not fine at all” during the interview because he still remembers the loss “all too well.”
Sportswriters, sports talk show hosts, and television sports personalities covering a particular highly paid NFL player they don’t like, or who is not performing well “could write a book on how to ruin someone’s perfect day.”
Teammates in football sometimes change teams at the same rate as Taylor Swift changes boyfriends, and they can do so depending on the length of their contract they signed to play on a team. Serial free agents are a lot like Taylor Swift, and they often like to besmirch former teammates, coaches, or the folks running the team from the front office.
Swift frequently becomes a free agent, but not always at her own will.
The NFL can cut its players without pay at any time in their contract. Owners and coaches have little trouble saying “you’re on your own kid” when, for example, a running back loses a step or exceeds his typical useful life of three to five years.
NFL players begin each season in training camps running from late July until on or near Labor Day weekend. Over 90 players report for a quick, grueling six or seven weeks but they’re pared down to a roster of 53 players at least a week before their season-opening contest.
For those nearly 40 athletes not making the cut who don’t get to find other teams and tell their old teams, like Swift told Jake Gyllenhaal in a song, “I Knew You Were Trouble” they sadly realize “It was indeed a cruel summer.”
Finally, a San Franciso 49-er quarterback, Brock Purdy, who was 2022’s Mr. Irrelevant – the term for the last player picked in each year’s NFL draft.
For all those team’s who passed on Purdy, the young quarterback showed them “karma (took) all (his) friends to the summit” when he reached the NFC Conference title game. The rookie signal caller and his team lost 31-7, but the karma the other 14 starting quarterbacks among the other NFC teams were feeling the bad side of karma, instead.
Swifties, you’re gonna enjoy the NFL even when the cameras don’t pan the stadium looking for your pop superstar chest-bumping her friends in the luxury suites.