The NFL's Taylor Swift Obsession Is Officially Too Much | Bobby Burack

There is no bigger Swiftie right now than the NFL.

Taylor Swift was in attendance for the Sunday Night Football matchup between the Chiefs and Jets. Like the week prior, she appeared in a suite to cheer on her maybe-boyfriend Travis Kelce.

Swift is the biggest star in the country. Estimates say she is ten times more famous than Patrick Mahomes, the best player in the NFL. Her rumored relationship with Kelce transcends interest beyond sports.

Her association with the Chiefs is unlike most current news stories. It's neither toxic, racial, nor political. People enjoy it.

We don't blame the NFL and its broadcast partners for capitalizing on the interest. But there is a line. There's always a line.

In this case, the line is divided between "fun" and "too much." And the NFL's fawning over Swift has approached the latter.

Showing Swift pre-game and after Kelce's touchdowns is fine.

Changing the NFL banner to Taylor Swift is funny:

The NFL declaring the Chiefs a bunch of Swifties is amusing:

Timely allusions to her songs once in a while are clever:

Yet Sunday's broadcast was cringe.

Chiefs running back Isiah Pacheco scored the first touchdown of the game on an out-of-nowhere 48-yard touchdown run. However, NBC did not show Pacheco or the Chiefs' reaction to the play.

Instead, the cameras immediately cut to Swift in the box:

What connection does Swift have to Pacheco? None. In fact, it's unlikely Swift knows who the former 7th-round pick is.

Nonetheless, she took precedence over Pacheco's touchdown back in his home state of New Jersey.

The in-game camera shot of Swift was the first of many. The NBC broadcast showed Swift a total of 17 times during the game.

(Seventeen times!)

There are only four quarters in a football game. Meaning, the broadcast cut to her over four times a quarter.

Also known as far too frequently.

It was not as if the game lacked suspense, and therefore needed Swift to maintain interest.

The Jets tied the game 20-20 after the first possession of the third quarter. It was a one-possession game until the clock struck 0:00 in the fourth.

Quarterback Zack Wilson put forth his best performance as a pro, after weeks of jangling ridicule. He outplayed Mahomes in every statistical category. Wilson's performance was the biggest on-field storyline of the week.

The difference between 2-2 and 1-3, the two possible outcomes for the Jets, is substantial. It could be the difference between making and missing the playoffs. It probably was.

Drama consumed the matchup, from Mahomes' head-scratching interceptions to the Jets' untimely fumble to at least four seemingly erroneous penalty calls that shifted the game's momentum.

And yet, as New York Post sports and entertainment reporter Ryan Glasspiegel noted, the broadcasters "decided to pivot to talking about Taylor Swift nonstop despite the tie game in the fourth quarter."

Who cares if the game is tied with minutes to go? Taylor just whispered something to a friend. Get the camera on her immediately.

Sunday night's fixation on Swift bordered on sycophancy. As do the reporters who continue to bombard Chiefs players with questions about Taylor.

NBC's camera rarely shied away from Taylor Swift Sunday, despite plenty of other game-related storylines. (Photo by Elsa/Getty Images).

Last week, Mahomes injured his ankle in the second quarter of the game. He injured the same ankle that compromised him during the playoffs last season. Luckily, he proved Sunday that his ankle is fine. But we didn't know he was fine until Sunday.

Why?

Despite several conversations with the press last week, reporters never asked Mahomes about his injury. They asked him about Taylor Swift instead, including during a post-game interview an hour after twisting his ankle:

"Can we ask one less Taylor Swift question and maybe one more about the ankle of the best player in the world?" asked sportscaster Dan Patrick on Monday.

Dan Patrick says the coverage of Swift should not come at the expense of actual reporting. And it most certainly has.

NBC's edict to focus so heavily on Swift was made pre-game. The broadcasters, cameramen, and studio team received the memo.

We don't doubt there the a rating incentive to the decision.

Last week, the Fox broadcast of Chiefs-Bears saw an 8.1% uptick in viewership among females ages 12-17.

NBC expects to see a similar spike.

Still, this is the NFL.

The NFL is not the WNBA. It is not starving for viewers and relevancy. The NFL is the number-one TV show on six different networks.

NFL broadcast partners don't need to undermine their own product for a short-term spike among non-football viewers.

The networks do not need to sell out to Swifties with the equivalent of click-bait editorial, at which point they risk alienating their actual consumer base.

Once more, there is a line.

The 9-year-old perpetually singing and dancing to Swift is cute at first. Yet after a while, her parents become annoyed and want to shout.

The NFL has become that little girl. And needs to cool it with Taylor Swift.