Travis Kelce is not taking any chances ahead of this year’s Super Bowl.
Speaking this week on the “New Heights” podcast, the Kansas City Chiefs tight end Kelce issued a request to fans of the team before the matchup with the Philadelphia Eagles — to leave Philly’s iconic Rocky Balboa statue alone.
“Chiefs [fans], do not touch the f—ing Rocky memorial, OK?” said Kelce. “Do not do that. Definitely don’t put an 87 [jersey] on there. Do not do that.”
Kelce has good reason to be wary here. Before last week’s NFC title game, fans of the San Francisco 49ers apparently got to the bronze statue of Rocky, located by the Philadelphia Museum of Art, “vandalizing” it with 49ers gear (see here). The Eagles went on to stomp the 49ers 31-7. Combined with a few other such instances in the past (most notably in 2018 when Minnesota Vikings fans put their team’s gear on Rocky only for the Vikings to also get shredded by the Eagles 38-7 during that year’s NFC title game), messing with that statue appears to be a great way to put a hex on your own team.
It helps that the Super Bowl is taking place in Arizona, meaning that Chiefs fans will be far away from Philadelphia. But Kelce has something else big to play for this year as well, so it doesn’t hurt for him to be a little superstitious.
