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On Sunday, the Kansas City Chiefs will be making the team\u2019s fourth Super Bowl appearance in the last five seasons. While some N.F.L. players go their entire career without playing for a championship, one of Kansas City\u2019s newcomers had their ticket punched after only 12 games.<\/p>\n
As Nicole Auerbach of The Athletic said on X<\/a>, shortly after the Chiefs\u2019 championship win: \u201cTaylor Swift makes the Super Bowl in her first year in the league. Elite.\u201d<\/p>\n Ms. Swift, who has been dating Travis Kelce, Kansas City\u2019s star tight end, has changed the N.F.L. conversation all season, attracting a new audience for the league and inspiring strong emotions (both positive and negative) among fans. Her critics as well as her detractors may have some burning questions ahead of the game. First and foremost: Will she be there?<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Ms. Swift, as you may have heard, is good at keeping secrets<\/a>. Her plans, beyond concert dates, are rarely announced in advance. That has led some to devise their own methods for figuring out what she\u2019s up to. Ahead of a Kansas City game in October, for example, an NBC producer said he had a spotter plane searching the area around MetLife Stadium<\/a> for police escorts in hopes of alerting the television crew if she showed up (she did).<\/p>\n Mr. Kelce was inundated with questions about Ms. Swift last week, and while he said he had heard some of her upcoming album<\/a> \u2014 spoiler: he likes it \u2014 he did not offer any details about whether she would be at the game.<\/p>\n That being said, Ms. Swift has adjusted her busy schedule to allow her to attend 12 games already this season, so missing out on a potential Super Bowl win seems unlikely. The Associated Press reported on Saturday afternoon that her plane had been seen in Los Angeles.<\/p>\n She sure was. Her Eras Tour resumed recently, and on Saturday night in Tokyo she performed yet another marathon set of her extensive catalog of songs. With flights from Tokyo to Las Vegas often taking 13 hours or more, and human beings requiring sleep, some worried she might not make the game.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n The Japanese Embassy in Washington pointed out<\/a> that timing is not a real hurdle for Ms. Swift. First of all, a private jet shortens the journey (and provides a place to sleep peacefully if needed). Second of all, the international date line is her friend.<\/p>\n In 1873, before the international date line officially existed, the author Jules Verne mapped out Ms. Swift\u2019s time advantage in \u201cAround the World in 80 Days.\u201d In the book, the protagonist Phileas Fogg believes he has lost his bet only to realize the distance and direction of his travels had saved him:<\/p>\n In journeying eastward he had gone towards the sun, and the days therefore diminished for him as many times four minutes as he crossed degrees in this direction. There are three hundred and sixty degrees on the circumference of the earth; and these three hundred and sixty degrees, multiplied by four minutes, gives precisely twenty-four hours \u2014 that is, the day unconsciously gained. In other words, while Phileas Fogg, going eastward, saw the sun pass the meridian eighty<\/em> times, his friends in London only saw it pass the meridian seventy-nine<\/em> times. This is why they awaited him at the Reform Club on Saturday, and not Sunday, as Mr. Fogg thought.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Or, as \u201cThe West Wing\u201d summarized more succinctly in a scene that discussed President Bartlett\u2019s journey from Tokyo to Washington, D.C. (and that recently went viral<\/a> online):<\/p>\n Josh:<\/strong> He\u2019s gonna land in Washington an hour before he took off? For older generations, those scenes helped explain the logistics of the international date line. For Gen Z and younger, their frame of reference will likely be \u2026 when Taylor Swift flew to Las Vegas for the Super Bowl.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n No one ever seemed to mind Jack Nicholson being a fixture<\/a> at Los Angeles Lakers games, or Spike Lee being more associated with the New York Knicks<\/a> than most of the team\u2019s players. Drake got only a slap on the wrist<\/a> when he began walking onto the court during timeouts at Toronto Raptors playoff games. But even though Ms. Swift receives relatively little airtime<\/a> during the broadcasts of Kansas City\u2019s games, she has become a target for those who still think she\u2019s getting outsize attention.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \u201cThe attention is there because the audience wants to see it,\u201d Jason Kelce, brother of Travis, said in an interview during last week\u2019s Pro Bowl festivities. \u201cIf people didn\u2019t want to see it they wouldn\u2019t be showing it.\u201d<\/p>\n As Ms. Swift put it<\/a>, \u201ca few dads, Brads, and Chads\u201d may be angry, but the TV networks are thrilled. A ratings analysis<\/a> by The Upshot indicated that she very well may be a driving factor for the league\u2019s increased audience. Coach Andy Reid of the Chiefs has repeatedly said that he\u2019s happy to have her around, and the N.F.L., which is enjoying an unexpected expansion of its built-in audience, has fully embraced her association with the league.<\/p>\n \u201cN.F.L. fans come in all types \u2014 even global sensations,\u201d said Alex Riethmiller, an N.F.L. spokesman. \u201cWe\u2019re glad to have Taylor on board.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n During the regular season, Ms. Swift attended numerous games in Kansas City while seated in a luxury suite controlled by Mr. Kelce\u2019s close friend and longtime teammate, Patrick Mahomes. She appeared to become fast friends with Mr. Mahomes\u2019s wife, Brittany, and was regularly seen with other members of the Mahomes family.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n She has also spent time at games with Mr. Kelce\u2019s parents, Donna and Ed, and her own father, mother and brother came with her to a game on Christmas. During Ms. Swift\u2019s trip to New Jersey for a Chiefs-Jets game she was seated with friends like the actors Ryan Reynolds and Blake Lively.<\/p>\n At a playoff game in Buffalo last month, she and Kylie Kelce were among those shown reacting to Jason Kelce\u2019s shirtless bellowing<\/a> and fraternizing with the crowd.<\/p>\n And at the A.F.C. championship game in Baltimore, she was surrounded by Mr. Kelce\u2019s family and associates, including Donna and Ed Kelce, Jason and Kylie Kelce and Mr. Kelce\u2019s managers<\/a>, Aaron and Andr\u00e9 Eanes. There were also a few of Ms. Swift\u2019s friends, like the actress Keleigh Teller and the model Cara Delevingne.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Ms. Swift has said she loves the number 13, and her fans can seemingly find it everywhere. In the case of this year\u2019s Super Bowl, the examples are plentiful:<\/p>\n Super Bowl 58 (5+8=13)<\/p>\n<\/li>\n Feb. 11, 2\/11 (2+11=13)<\/p>\n<\/li>\n Kansas City is playing the 49ers (4+9=13)<\/p>\n<\/li>\n The 49ers were the No. 1 seed in the N.F.C., while the Chiefs were the No. 3 seed in the A.F.C. (1 and 3 \u2014 13)<\/p>\n<\/li>\n This is the 13th N.F.L. game Ms. Swift has attended this season<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n It is unclear if it is a good or bad sign that San Francisco\u2019s starting quarterback, Brock Purdy, wears No. 13. Time will tell.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nHas Taylor hinted at her Super Bowl plans?<\/h2>\n
But wasn\u2019t she in Tokyo \u2026 last night?<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Sam:<\/strong> Yeah.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\nWhy is this getting so much attention?<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
If she makes it to the game, who might she sit with?<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
This is Taylor, surely there\u2019s some numerology involved?<\/h2>\n
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