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Travis Kelce passed Jason Witten on Monday night, thanks largely to a massive catch he brought down during the Kansas City Chiefs’ season-opening win over the Denver Broncos.
Kelce caught a short pass from Patrick Mahomes midway through the third quarter of their 31-10 win at Arrowhead Stadium, and absolutely took off as fast as he could. After shedding one tackle, he had so much room to work with that he nearly made it all the way to the end zone. Finally, he was brought down inside the 5 yard line.
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Naturally, Kelce was hyped.
The 36-year-old, who is listed at 6-foot-5, 250 pounds, nearly hit 17 mph at his peak during that run, too. In total, Kelce made it 59 yards on that catch. That eventually led to a field goal, which put the Chiefs up 24-10 at the time.
They added one more touchdown and rolled the rest of the way to secure the 21-point win.
The catch was just Kelce’s second of the night. But it was more than enough to move Kelce past Witten on the NFL’s tight ends all-time receiving yards list. Witten racked up 13,046 receiving yards during his career with the Dallas Cowboys. Kelce entered this season only 44 yards shy of Witten’s mark.
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Kelce finished the game with 71 yards on three catches. That brought him to 13,073 in his career, which is good for second on the all-time list. Only Hall of Famer and former Chiefs star Tony Gonzalez is ahead of him. Gonzalez had 15,127 receiving yards in his career.
Kelce is the only active tight end even remotely close to Gonzalez’s record. Free agent Zach Ertz has 8,592 receiving yards in his career, and San Francisco 49ers star George Kittle just surpassed the 8,000-yard mark.
Kelce still has a ways to go to catch Gonzalez. But record aside, his 14th NFL season got off to the perfect start.
