Is something rotten at the heart of the Kansas City Chiefs? | Melissa Jacobs

Underneath the Super Bowl wins and coaching records and the paparazzi swooning over the Travis Kelce-Taylor Swift relationship is a different, more sinister narrative

The hype is both manufactured and real. A new NFL season is inching closer, and the sights and smells of hope are intoxicating. No 1 overall draft pick Caleb Williams has one sensational series in the first quarter of the first preseason game and Bears fans already have amnesia when it comes to the franchise's long history of underwhelming signal-callers. Maybe Williams will be the next Patrick Mahomes - he really looked like a stud.

But for now, and until he stops playing quarterback at a level in a different stratosphere than everyone else, Mahomes is the unquestioned face of the NFL. And the Kansas City Chiefs, with their ticket seemingly punched to the Super Bowl on an annual basis, are the gold standard of NFL organizations. Jolly Andy Reid, once underestimated but shrewd as hell, is the coaching face of the league. And of course, Travis Kelce is the face of the NFL for Swifties new to the football or anyone who cares about celebrity gossip.