Chiefs’ Travis Kelce believes playoff rematch with Bills would yield different result
Much was made of the Chiefs’ undefeated season coming to an end Sunday with a 30-21 loss to the Bills in Orchard Park, New York.
But Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce said on the latest episode of the New Heights podcast that the players’ focus wasn’t on the unbeaten record. It was about winning games period.
“You don’t think about, ‘Oh, I really want to win this game so I can remain undefeated.’ No, we want to win this game because we have a lot of really close football games against the Buffalo Bills and we love competing against them, because they’re one of the best teams in the league,” Kelce said.
“I get fired up playing against the best teams in the National Football League. And I was fired up for this one, and I didn’t play my best. And that ... pisses me off, and it made me go right back into work on Monday after the game and get after it and find a way to make (things) right.”
The Chiefs’ focus is on the NFL’s first-ever Super Bowl three-peat. Kelce believes in this year’s team because KC has hoisted the Lombardi Trophy multiple times.
Kelce admitted the Chiefs didn’t play well against the Bills but thinks the loss is an aberration.
“I think this is something that you won’t see out of us in the future. I think we’re very confident that we’ll get the things fixed,” he said. “We have all the talent that we need to go and win another Super Bowl. I’ve been on Super Bowl-winning teams. We have enough talent to make a run at this thing. And I think everybody knows that.
“All we’ve got to do is just be at our best, and that’s what we were not for four quarters. I mean, there wasn’t a single quarter that it was like, ‘Oh yeah, we outplayed them. We got them on that.’ No, they were out there, they had a little bit more idea what we were doing, and they were fundamentally more sound in a lot of different .areas.”
Kelce’s challenge to the team
The Chiefs enter Week 12 with the AFC’s best record at 9-1. Fatigue can set in as the calendar hits late November. But Kelce expects the Chiefs to be mentally strong.
“I don’t give a (care) how your body’s feeling. I don’t give a (care) where your mentality is off the field,” he said. “When you step in that building, we are here to figure it out, and we are here to get better as football players for the football team. I think that is a mentality going forward that everybody has to be a part of, top down.
“And I think myself included, I’ve got to be the leader that I’ve been in the past and hold myself accountable so that everybody sees how it’s done, and knowing that we’ve got a lot of new faces and a lot of rookies and whatnot.”
Excited to face Bills again
Losing has been a great motivator for the Chiefs. Just look to their previous defeat to the Raiders on Christmas Day last year. That lit a fire under the Chiefs and they won their final six games of the season, including four in the playoffs.
En route to the Super Bowl LVIII championship, the Chiefs beat the Bills in Buffalo in an AFC Divisional playoff game. Kelce seems eager to face the Bills again in the postseason and believes the outcome would be different than Sunday.
“Sometimes you just need that smack in the face. It is what it is,” he said. “Sometimes you need a smack in the face to lock in and know that this is it’s an ‘Any Given Sunday’ type league.
“And not saying that that team was just any other team, but I do believe we have better players, and (if) we get another shot at that team (in the playoffs), I definitely get excited about it.”
This story was originally published November 20, 2024 at 12:25 PM.
