Patrick Mahomes had just fumbled the ball. It was deep in the fourth quarter and this one-sided Super Bowl had long been over.

Travis Kelce walked off the field, removed his helmet and stood on his own. He talked to nobody before walking away, sitting down on the bench and, looking devastated, took it all in.

Kelce is usually at the center of everything for the Chiefs on game day, from being a threat on the field to its biggest cheerleader off it. If Mahomes is its brain, the тιԍнт end is its heart.

But Kelce was far away from the play again and nowhere the action. Anybody concerned that Fox’s broadcast may get taken over by Kelce and Taylor Swift need not have worried. He was redundant and she had nothing to celebrate all night.

If this is to be Kelce’s NFL curtain call then he has left without a whimper. He finished with four catches and 39 yards from six targets.

This performance will also now lead to a greater inquest as to why he went out for dinner with Taylor Swift less than 48 hours before kick-off of the biggest game of his life.

Travis Kelce was anonymous as the Kansas City Chiefs were humiliated in the Super Bowl

Kelce looked devastated on the bench after the Chiefs failed in their bid to do the three-peeat

No one can know for sure what was going through Kelce’s head when he decided to head for a French restaurant in the Uptown neighborhood of New Orleans on Friday night. But it opened the door to doubts that his attention was elsewhere.

When NFL history is on the line and, at 35, opportunities to win more Super Bowls are only going to decrease, why would you open yourself up to such scrutiny? It did not look good at the time. Now it looks irresponsible.

Mahomes should also take his portion of the blame. It was a double date after all. His performance, the worst of his career, also suggests he’d have been better off resting up or watching tape in his H๏τel room.

Kelce said this week he could see himself playing for three more years. But reports emerged Saturday that his future is actually far less clear, and this sort of performance shows time is running out.

It was not a friendly goodbye, either. When actor Jon Hamm took the microphone to introduce the Chiefs to field, the deafening boos that greeted them could be heard in Philadelphia.

Jason Kelce watched on as his little brother got booed from the outset. The jeering also extended to Swift when she appeared on the screens at both ends of the Superdome early in the game.

Kelce’s first opportunity to make his mark came on the Chiefs’ opening drive. It was 2 and 9 when a pᴀss over the middle by Mahomes looked like it would be a routine catch. That connection we have seen so many times before.

Kelce was under pressure and couldn’t hold onto the pᴀss. Just as he dropped the ball, a crunching hit to the back sent him tumbling to the ground.

He got up, shook it off and ran back to the huddle but it was an early error that contributed to the Chiefs having to punt the ball away.

To make things worse Dallas Goedert, who was in Kelce’s тιԍнт end shadow for much of the build-up to this game, made his first play with no trouble. A simple catch on the move as the Eagles marched downfield and scored with a tush push.

Kelce finished with four catches and 39 yards from six targets and had no impact on the game 

The Chiefs’ response was underwhelming to say the least as the Eagles defense swarmed Mahomes and gave up no ground for the rest of the first quarter.

An interception by Bryan Cook should have been injected some energy into the Chiefs offense but they went three and out with Kelce failing collect another pᴀss.

On third down, Mahomes looked for his тιԍнт end again. His pᴀss was too low and Kelce couldn’t get down to scoop it up. Something was off, the best friends were on different wavelengths.

They finally connected for the first time with just under three minutes left in the third quarter with an eight-yard pᴀss and catch in the middle of the field. Mahomes nearly got picked off on the next play as the Eagles’ dominance continued.

At 34-0, with the Chiefs scrambling to avoid becoming the first team to suffer a shutout in a Super Bowl, Mahomes found Kelce with a nice flick. 

They got on the scoreboard with Xavier Worthy’s touchdown but Kelce couldn’t haul in Mahomes’ pᴀss for a two-point conversion. It summed up their night.

More to follow.