There are no Taylor Swift sightings to speak of, but downtown Kansas City has turned into a sea of red for Valentine’s Day as Chiefs fans prepare to celebrate their third Super Bowl title in five seasons with a parade.
“It never gets old,” Kansas City Mayor Quinton Lucas posted on Francisco.
The key on many fans’ minds is whether pop superstar Taylor Swift would join her boyfriend Travis Kelce for the parade and victory speeches. Swift has not commented. She has a show in Melbourne, Australia, on Friday night, the first of three concerts scheduled on her Eras Tour.
Still, that long shot, combined with unusually warm temperatures of 15 to 20 degrees Celsius (60 Fahrenheit), is expected to generate a crowd that city officials estimate could top 1 million.
‘I missed last year. I said, ‘I’m not going to miss this year,'” said lifelong fan Charles Smith Sr., who flew from his home in Sicklerville, New Jersey, to attend the parade.
Chiefs fan Scott Shepard poses with ‘KC’ chains around his neck before the parade, where 1 million fans are expected to attend.
Some fans hoped to catch a glimpse of Taylor Swift and some made signs referencing her lyrics.
Fans gathered along the parade route with commemorative hats and banners on Wednesday.
Known to his friends as Kansas City Smitty, the 52-year-old first became a Chiefs fan when Christian Okoye played fullback for the team in the late 1980s.
“I have a history with this team,” he said, adding that he ran out of his house with a giant flag, shouting “Kansas City,” when the Chiefs won in overtime.
The city and the team each contributed about $1 million to the event that commemorates Kelce, Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs becoming the first team since Tom Brady and the New England Patriots two decades ago to defend their title.
Some fans camped overnight and others began staking out spots before dawn to hit the best viewing spots. Bailey McDermott, 17, and Gracie Gilby, 16, from Lebanon, Missouri, got up at 3 a.m. to make the three-hour drive to the parade. They had a watch party and bursts of confetti erupted when the Chiefs won.
“I finally freaked out,” said Gilby, who was wearing a sequined Chiefs jersey with Kelce’s No. 87. McDermott also had a sequined jersey, his own with Mahomes’ No. 15.
No, that’s not Patrick Mahomes. In reality, he is a shirtless man wearing a large mask of the famous face of the Super Bowl MVP.
Many of the area’s largest school districts have canceled classes and businesses along the parade route are turning the day into a holiday for their workers. At least 600 Kansas City police officers will be stationed along the 2-mile (3.22-kilometer) route, Police Chief Stacey Graves said.
Teenagers and younger children were everywhere, some throwing soccer balls, others watching replays of match highlights on giant television screens.
Among them was Elysseah Buford and her friend, Devaun Burns, who watched the game while taking orders at McDonald’s. ‘We are losing. “We’re losing,” Buford recalled saying. But Burns scolded her, even when a coach declared the game a lost cause: “I told him, ‘Don’t talk about it.’ Believe it.’
The 18-year-old Raymore high school senior joined the festivities with another friend, 17-year-old Mekiyzeion Williams. who dared to ask what would have happened if Mecole Hardman missed the final touchdown catch. “Shut up,” Burns said.
After decades without a championship, the city is gaining experience with victory parades. Five seasons ago, the Chiefs defeated the 49ers to win the team’s first Super Bowl championship in 50 years. That followed the Kansas City Royals winning the World Series in 2015, the city’s first baseball championship in 30 years. That year, fans abandoned their cars on the side of the road so they could walk to the celebration.
Then last year, the Chiefs defeated the Philadelphia Eagles 38-35 and prophetically promised they would come back for more.
A big change this year is that the parade will start an hour earlier, at 11 a.m., so the crowd will thin out before the Valentine’s Day dinner crowd arrives.
After the massive cleanup, the team prepares to try again.