Travis Kelce ‘Loves to Compete’—Here’s If He’ll Be Ready To Play Tonight
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It’s so close we can practically taste football season, but preseason has been a bit of a bloodbath in terms of injuries sustained at practice, including the top tight end in the competition. So if you’re wondering how long Travis Kelce will be out and if he’ll start in week 1 against the Detroit Lions… whew boy, here’s everything we know.
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Kelce is the star tight end for the Kansas City Chiefs and is considered one of the greatest NFL players of all time. He’s an eight-time Pro Bowler and four-time first-team All-Pro selection. He holds the NFL record for seven of the most consecutive and most overall seasons with 1,000 yards receiving by a tight end. In 2022, he and his brother Jason—center for the Philadelphia Eagles—made NFL history as being the first brothers to face off against each other in a Super Bowl.
Each had won a Super Bowl before—Travis in 2020 with the Chiefs and Jason for the Eagles in 2018—but at Super Bowl LVII, there was a heightened sense of sibling rivalry. “We started thinking that reality is just never going to happen. Then this year started out of nowhere and it just took off on its own almost. It’s just amazing,” their mother Donna told CBS two days before kickoff. “Since Travis was a little kid trying to prove he’s as good as his brother. And Jason, since he was a little kid, he’s been trying to make sure his brother knows he’s not as good as he is,” their father Ed said.
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Now, his injury at practice has fans—particularly those who splurged on him in their fantasy draft—worried for the beginning of his 2023 football season.
Will Travis Kelce play tonight?
Of course, everyone wants to know if Travis Kelce will play in week 1 against the Detroit Lions on Thursday, September 7, 2023, after he suffered a hyperextended knee injury in practice on Tuesday, September 4, 2023. The answer is that it’ll be a game-time decision, but it appears he won’t play. No offense to the Lions, but the Chiefs probably don’t need Kelce to get a win tonight so they may rest him as a precaution.
NFL Insider Ian Rapoport tweeted just hours before kickoff: “Sources: #Chiefs star TE Travis Kelce is out tonight against the #Lions. He may give it another try before kickoff. Either way, the bone bruise should not keep him out long-term,” which is good news for Kelce fans because this injury can have players, worst case, starring down the barrel of six to nine months recovery time.
Rapoport. had tweeted on Thursday morning that “Cheifs owner Clark Hunt on @GMFB, on Travis Kelce: We hope that he’ll be able to go tonight. He’ll be a game-time decision, but he’s somebody who loves to compete, so I wouldn’t bet against him being on the field tonight.’ Still up in the air. But some optimism…”
ESPN Senior NFL Insider Adam Schefter tweeted earlier in the day: “After tests today, the Chiefs believe Travis Kelce’s ACL is intact, per source. There is inflammation in his knee, and they will test it again Wednesday to determine his availability for Thursday night vs. the Lions.”
Rapoport also tweeted: “#Chiefs star TE Travis Kelce’s status is in doubt for Thursday night’s opener vs. the #Lions because of his knee injury, but sources tell me and @TomPelissero it’s not believed to be a long-term injury. They’ll wait for swelling to go down and go from there.”
Travis’s brother Jason, center for the Phili Eagles, went on the WIP Morning Show in Philadelphia on the morning of September 6 to say that he was optimistic his brother would be active for the season opener against the Lions. “Travis, this was out on the field, and I know he’s got some swelling going on, but it sounds like as long as they can get that down, he’s going to have a chance to go [play],” Jason said.
“The ligaments and everything are intact structurally from what we know right now. His knee is fine. It’s about getting the swelling down and then seeing how bruised the bone is because… they can be pretty painful if it’s in a spot that’s rubbing all the time… I think he’s going to be good to go. I really do.”
Remarkably, Travis Kelce hasn’t missed a game due to injury in a decade. In his rookie season in 2013, he played just one professional snap before a knee injury forced him to miss the remainder of the year.
What happened to Travis Kelce?
The champion Tight End suffered a hyperextended knee at practice on September 4. Chiefs head coach Andy Reid told reporters that “Kelc hyperextended his knee today, so we’ll see how he does going forward,” he said during a post-practice press conference. “They’re looking at it now,” Reid said when asked what the status of Kelce’s injury was.
“I was in on that play, so I was running a route,” teammate Skyy Moore said when asked about Kelce’s knee injury after practice, via The Athletic. “I was talking to somebody, and [Kelce] was limping, just walking off the field. It was a good sign to see him get up by himself and get off the field.”
How long is hyperextended knee recovery?
Hyperextended knee recovery varies greatly on how severe the injury is, starting from two weeks to the worst-case scenario of six to nine months.
According to the Cleveland Clinic, a severe hyperextended knee can lead to an ACL (anterior cruciate ligament) tear, which is generally a season-ending injury for football players: “A hyperextended knee is an injury that happens when your knee is bent backward beyond its usual limit. … It’s possible that an injury can damage one or multiple ligaments in your knee, including during a hyperextension. Severe hyperextensions are common causes of ACL and MCL tears. … Knee hyperextensions range from mild cases that you can treat at home to more severe injuries that will need surgery to repair.”
Luckily, it doesn’t sound like Kelce’s injury is quite that serious: his ACL is intact, but there is swelling that the docs are keeping an eye on. While it may not be a season-ender, it does have fantasy football owners worried for their lineups for week 1, as they would’ve spent high on the TE in drafts. It would explain why the Chief’s other tight end Noah Gray’s fantasy value was up pretty significantly across leagues on Wednesday.
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