The Kansas City Chiefs ended a forgettable regular season (6-11) after their sixth consecutive loss in Week 18 against the Las Vegas Raiders, 14-12.
However, Andy Reid’s team had already been eliminated from the playoffs weeks earlier, and the situation baffled fans and the team itself, which had been participating for a decade, something that tight end Travis Kelce felt was made worse by Patrick Mahomes’ injury.
Travis admits that Mahomes’ absence hurt the team
In Week 15 against the Los Angeles Chargers, the 30-year-old quarterback had to be taken off the field after suffering a torn anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) in the final two minutes of the game. It was also during this game that Kansas City was officially eliminated from the playoffs.
Without Patrick on the field and with a few games left to play, the team was unable to recover from the absence of its star QB and lost the last three games remaining on the schedule.
In a new episode of “New Heights,” the podcast hosted by Travis and Jason Kelce, the Chiefs tight end admitted that it was a “tough season” and that Mahomes’ injury undoubtedly influenced the final stretch: “[It] ended worse because my guy 15, [Patrick Mahomes], went down.”
Although he underwent successful surgery the next day, Monday, December 15, he is expected to be out for 9 to 12 months and be ready to return to the field for the start of the 2026 season in September, although everything will depend on the progress of his recovery. However, he was not the only player on the team affected by injuries:
“We finished the season with a lot of our guys banged up… It’s a tough way to go out, especially with the amount of success and the standard you hold yourself and your team to,” he said, adding, “You try to look back and learn from it and try to figure out where it went wrong or how you could’ve been better.”
He also took the opportunity to reflect and thank his teammates for their efforts this year: “It’s just a s***y feeling and a s***y way to try and navigate one of the things you love the most to do, playing football. I appreciate everyone that was out there giving it their all… made it as good as we could have going into the last week and the end of the season.”
As for Travis, he is currently playing his 13th season, but without a doubt, none has been as uphill as this one. At 36 years old and in the final year of his contract, many fans speculate that this campaign was the TE’s last, but he himself assured that it will depend on his physical condition and that he will make a decision “when it all settles down.”
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