Former NFL GM Explains Why Chiefs Would Be Smart to Not Bring Back Travis Kelce

Travis Kelce still has not announced his intentions heading into the 2026 NFL season. With the NFL draft two months away and free agency starting in a few weeks there has been no official word from the Kelce camp.

While the team has said it would welcome Kelce back next season, at least one former NFL executive says the franchise should just move on because Kelce is too old. That person is former Jets general manager and Dolphins executive vice president of football operations Mike Tannenbaum, who shared that controversial take on Get Up on Monday morning.

"I wouldn't do it," said Tannenbaum about bringing Kelce back. "And that's when you're in the front office and you're a head coach, you have to make the honest and sober observation that you want to pay a player for what they are going to do, no what they've done. He is slowing down."

.@RealTannenbaum's comments about Travis Kelce had @JasonMcCourty shocked 😳 pic.twitter.com/vKhrnRlGmC
— Get Up (@GetUpESPN) February 23, 2026

Tannenbaum went on to point out that Kelce's catch total dropped from 97 in '24 to 76 in '25 and note the ages of the top tight ends in the NFL right now. Trey McBride, Brock Bowers and Sam LaPorta all are in their mid-20's and there are a number of enticing prospects at the position in the upcoming draft.

While those are excellent points in the world of cold hard business decisions, the reactions of the other panelists—most notably Jason McCourty—tell the truth about the situation.

What Tannenbaum doesn't take into account here is that Kelce is one of the very few guys that an NFL franchise should never push out the door. He's played his entire Hall of Fame career in Kansas City and won three Super Bowls. This is one of the rarest opportunities in modern sports and if Kelce wants to play until the wheels completely fall off, he's earned the right to do it with the team that drafted him.

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