Roger Goodell is all about Taylor Swift popping up at NFL games. But he rejected as “nonsense” the idea that the league would script the outcome of its playoff games to get the Chiefs — and thus Swift — to the Super Bowl.
The NFL commissioner fielded plenty of questions about Swift at his annual Super Bowl press conference, including those about the supposed script that paved the way for Swift and Travis Kelce to take their relationship to the biggest stage in North American sports.
“I don’t think I’m that good a scripter, or anybody on our staff. Listen, there’s no way that I could have scripted that one. Let’s just put it that way,” Goodell said.
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Swift and Kelce’s storybook Super Bowl journey seems almost too perfect for the fortunes of the NFL, which benefits from increased viewership and buzz thanks to the pop star’s frequent attendance of the Chiefs’ games. Kansas City had a down year in the regular season compared to its lofty standards, yet the defending champions wound up reaching the Super Bowl despite playing the first two playoff road games in the Patrick Mahomes era.
Surely, or so the speculation goes, the NFL had to have something to do with this fortuitous result for Swift and the Chiefs?
“The idea that this was in a script, this is preplanned. It’s nonsense. It’s, frankly, not even worth talking about,” Goodell said.
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Swift brings with her a massive following, as evidenced by her constantly sold-out shows on the Eras Tour, which has already eclipsed $ 1 billion in ticket revenue. Goodell and his family are among the many who have attended the tour, as he, his wife and their twin daughters attended a show.
“She’s the best of the best and so having her come to NFL games, have her a part of that is nothing but a positive,” Goodell said. “Travis and Taylor are wonderful young people. They seem very happy. She knows great entertainment, and I think that’s why she loves NFL football. I think it’s great to have her a part of it.
“Obviously it creates a buzz, it creates another group of young fans, particularly young women that are interested in seeing why is she going to this game? Why is she interested in this game? Besides Travis, she is a football fan.”
