Theory That Chiefs’ Super Bowl Bid ft. Taylor Swift Was ‘Scripted’ Is ‘Nonsense,’ Says NFL Commissioner

The Kansas City Chiefs’ 17-10 win over the Baltimore Ravens was the most-watched AFC Championship game ever, drawing north of 55 million viewers. And in a TVLine poll, 44% think this Sunday’s Super Bowl between the Chiefs and 49ers will draw a “lot bigger” audience than the 115.1 million viewers who tuned into the Big Game last year.

Is “The Taylor Swift Effect” mostly to credit for the surge in interest?

NFL commissioner Roger Goodell addresses the rise in ratings in a Monday presser, first chalking it up to “the great competition” the regular season gone by served up.

“The competiiton has been off the charts this year,” Goodell says in the video below, claiming that 70% of games this season were within one score in the fourth quarter.

But “having the Taylor Swift Effect is also a positive,” he acknowledged.

“Both [Chiefs tight end] Travis [Kelce] and Taylor are wonderful, young people, they seem very happy,” he noted, and to have the pair’s months-old romance serve as a backdrop for the Chiefs’ Super Bowl run “obviously it creates a buzz, it creates another group of young fans, particularly young women, that are interested in seeing, ‘Why is she going to this game? Why is she interested in this game?’ And that’s great for us.”

It has been so great for the NFL that there are those who speculate that the league “arranged” this very public courtship between one of its players and the pop star.

“I don’t think I’m that good a scripter, or anybody on our staff,” Goodell said, chuckling at the suggestion the NFL “scripted” this months-long storyline. Swift is “a remarkable performer, she knows great entertainment… She’s the best of the best,” he added, “so having her come to NFL games is nothing but a positive.”

And to those who speculate even more wildly, that the NFL somehow put its thumb on the scale and helped steer Taylor’s boyfriend’s team into the post season and then TV’s most-watched annual event…? “

The idea that this was a script, that this was pre-planned, that’s nonsense,” Goodell said, per USA Today. “It’s frankly not even worth talking about. We see two people together having fun together. That’s wonderful. I wish them well.”