Travis Kelce has only been married to Taylor Swift for a few days but the peaceful honeymoon phase may already be over, as he faces a potential backlash from his Kansas City Chiefs teammates.
The NFL hero married the pop superstar, both 36, in New York last Friday having transformed Manhattan’s iconic Madison Square Garden into their dream venue, and inviting more than 1,000 guests to watch them tie the knot.
But despite that long list of invitees – which included stars from across Hollywood and brought together music, movie and sporting royalty – it seems there still wasn’t enough room for all of Kelce’s friends.
After Thursday night’s more intimate rehearsal dinner – also held at MSG but for only 100 of the couple’s nearest and dearest – the Daily Mail exclusively reported how some of Kelce’s NFL ‘circle’ had been left upset.
‘Not everyone on the team has the same invite,’ a source said, adding that certain players had been disappointed to discover they had been left out of the more intimate Thursday dinner, and only invited to Friday’s blowout.
Then on Monday, Taylor Lewan and Will Compton, ex-NFL players turned podcasters and, so they thought, good friends of Kelce, poured fuel on the fire by publicly outing themselves as two ‘snubbed’ pals who had not even been invited to Friday’s event.
Compton said he is ‘flabbergasted’. Lewan wondered if the exclusion was ‘a personal shot’ fired by Kelce.
Travis Kelce and Taylor Swift did not invite Harrison Butker to their New York wedding
Taylor Lewan (left) and Will Compton (second left) are surprised at being left out
Now, a Chiefs player has told the Daily Mail that the wedding invite drama has sparked locker-room chaos within Kelce’s team – with the apparent decision not to invite the controversial kicker Harrison Butker in particular having led to snipy text messages in various group chats between teammates.
Butker, a devout Catholic and outspoken Trump supporter who has won three Super Bowls alongside Kelce, gave a memorably divisive commencement speech at the Benedictine College in Kansas in 2024.
He referred to pride month as ‘a deadly sin’ and suggested women might consider prioritizing being a ‘homemaker’ over a career.
At the time, Kelce said he disagreed with Butker’s views. Swift, of course, is an outspoken Democrat and Trump critic.
Now the Chiefs player, who asked to remain anonymous, says: ‘It’s really their wedding and I understand why they wouldn’t have invited [Butker]. But there’s some difference of opinion [between players]. Lots of texts are going around the team and some people who are close to Harrison feel like he was snubbed.
‘The general idea was that there was a blanket invite for the team, but [every other player] received something individually. If Harrison had really wanted to come, he probably could have. But they’re not close, so… he wasn’t going to go, even if he had been invited.’
As a result, the Chiefs player added: ‘There’s now a lot of gossip going on. Training camp [for the new NFL season] starts in three weeks and it’s going to be a whole thing. A lot of guys want it to be drama [between Butker and Kelce]. They just like that s**t… a couple of the guys are being messy and texting Harrison to see what he thinks. We’re like a high school team sometimes.’
As for the team’s various group chats, a second Chiefs player, who also asked to remain anonymous, explained: ‘It’s not like all of us are in the same [group chat]. The team is too big. So there are groups that might just be like defense [players], or a certain group of guys. There are some with me in, some without me. I am in about seven chains of players, some are professional… some are just used for talking s**t.
‘I have chains that have Travis on them, and chains that don’t. You always have to check to make sure you’re sending to the right chain. There have been times where you’ll talk s**t about someone and then realize they are in the group, and have to laugh it off.
‘I think most of the texts about the wedding are probably being sent in the groups without Travis. I have one that has about eight of us and, before the wedding, it was like “Who’s going?” And everyone was saying where they were staying, or why they weren’t going.
‘I think maybe half the team went, probably less. A lot of people RSVP’d no, not because of anything bad, but because of a conflict. I didn’t go because I didn’t want to spend the 4th in New York and couldn’t bring my kids.
‘Some people asked, “Do we have to send them a gift?’, because they have more money than us, which was funny. People were coming up with funny things to send. I thought it would be funny to send him something that was monogrammed “Mr and Mrs Swift”. That type of thing. We sent each other memes and pictures.’
The first Chiefs player who spoke to the Daily Mail added: ‘Can’t say too much because Travis is my friend… Yeah, there are a few group texts. I’m on one with Harrison [Butker]. Someone sent a news story about him not being invited, and the group was like “WTF?” But he didn’t reply.
‘I don’t think anyone on the team wishes [Kelce] anything but good things. Everyone likes him. He’s a good teammate and a good friend. There’s locker room s**t but it’s nothing disrespectful.
‘Most of [our group] texts were just logistics about how people were getting from their hotels to the wedding, or what everyone was going to wear. The women [players’ wives and girlfriends] have other text groups. Taylor is officially a football wife now and she’ll be invited to their wine nights and stuff, but she won’t go. I’m sure of that. But if you want trash talk, you have to see their group texts. My girlfriend won’t even let me look at her phone to see it.’
Butker is a devout Catholic and outspoken Trump supporter who has won three Super Bowls alongside Kelce
Kelce hugs Butker after he kicked a game-winning field goal for the Chiefs back in 2024
Clearly, say insiders, Kelce and Swift decided that Butker would not be a welcome guest at MSG.
Travis’s older brother, Jason, also admitted back in 2024 that this wife Kylie had been upset by Butker’s comments.
‘My wife, she was I think a little bit frustrated with some of the comments,’ Jason, a father of four girls, revealed on the New Heights podcast he co-hosts with his brother.
‘A lot of the things [Butker] said in his commencement speech are not things that I align myself with, but he was giving a commencement speech at a Catholic university and, shocker, it ended up being a very religious and Catholic speech.’
But was an incident from two years ago enough for Kelce to leave Butker out entirely? Our first Chiefs player source sympathizes with the position Kelce has found himself in.
‘A few people think [Kelce and Swift] should’ve invited [Butker] explicitly but, really, why? He came at [Swift, who has prioritized an extremely successful career] first, it kind of was shade in the speech. And since when are you required to invite everyone to a wedding?’ the player said.
‘They act like coworkers, not friends. They’re chill with each other at work, but they’re never going to hang out as friends.
‘And there are a lot of weddings where the entire team isn’t invited. The only difference was that this one was like the f***ing royal wedding.’
Kelce now won’t reunite with all his Chiefs teammates until practice camp for the new season starts on July 28, with the first game of the season scheduled for September 14 at Arrowhead Stadium against Denver Broncos.
The newlyweds are expected to attend former Chiefs player JuJu Smith-Schuster’s wedding in Orange County, California next weekend along with several current Kansas City players.
Butker is not believed to be going to that wedding either, but it remains unclear if Smith-Schuster, who now plays for the New York Giants, has invited him.
‘Lots of texts are going around the team and some people who are close to Harrison feel like he was snubbed,’ our source said
Lewan called Kelce out over the wedding ‘snub’ on his podcast
Kelce will have some work to do to smooth over the fractured relationship with unhappy friends who feel left out.
Lewan and Compton, for example, are popular in NFL circles and, if they were to keep airing dirty laundry, it would unquestionably make things uncomfortable for Kelce whose reputation has been particularly stellar since his being linked to Swift.
‘Yo, we’re boys. I’ve known you for over 10 years,’ Lewan said Tuesday. ‘We text and call each other. I’m gonna take the high road but I’m just thinking, dude, I’m clearly doing something wrong in our friendship, clearly something wrong… There’s clearly a blind spot I’m not seeing.’
Butker, meanwhile, has been offered the chance to comment on his MSG no-show but, so far, there has been no reply.