NBC sports analyst and talk-show host Dan Patrick said the quiet part out loud over the weekend:
Don't blame Travis Kelce and Taylor Swift; blame the TV networks.
After TNT repeatedly showed the Kansas City Chiefs' star tight end and his pop music icon in attendance at a NHL's Stanley Cup game last week there was a fan backlash. But the math (and reasoning) is pretty simple.
Chiefs' quarterback Patrick Mahomes is one of the most popular players in the NFL, with a combined social media following of around 10 million. Swift's combined audience across all platforms? Try 561 million.
The Chiefs have 16 million.
By social media metrics, she's the fourth-most popular person on the planet behind only soccer star Cristiano Ronaldo and singers Selena Gomez, and Justin Bieber. In showing clips of Swift and Kelce, networks are simply attempting to cater to one of the largest fan bases in the world.
(Truth be told, why do you think we breathlessly cover the couple?)
There are sports fans angry that Swift is "ruining" sports by turning games into pop culture sideshows, but the networks are merely attempting to also grow their audience.
“The internet did not treat them kindly because they’re like, ‘They don’t have an affiliation with either of these teams. We don’t have to show them 50 times within the first 15 minutes of the game’," Patrick said. "But don’t blame Travis Kelce and Taylor Swift for going to the game. I don’t know, doesn’t that say something about your sport that they would like to go and be part of it?”
Patrick's point is well-taken. Hockey, which is struggling to earn TV ratings, should be thankful that a power couple is attending its Finals.
“She could go to a Chiefs game , and her boyfriend is playing for the Chiefs, but all of a sudden — it’s the networks who do this,” Patrick continued. “She doesn’t say, ‘I’ll go, but you have to show me 15 times.’ It doesn’t work that way. Blame the networks. Don’t blame her and him. The fact that they went to the game tells you, ‘Man, that’s pretty exciting.'”
It's 10-second cutaways of Swift in a booth while the puck - or football - isn't in play. Patrick is right: Swift at a game should be a bonus, not a distraction.