Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce appeared to get some special treatment from the referees during Sunday night’s AFC Championship win over the Buffalo Bills.
Late in the second quarter of Sunday’s game, Chiefs star quarterback Patrick Mahomes scored a touchdown after scrambling out of the pocket and taking off running toward the goal line.
As Mahomes crossed the goal line, he was hit by Bills safety Damar Hamlin, which elicited a reaction from Travis Kelce.
Shortly after Mahomes found the end zone, Kelce ran up to Hamlin and immediately got in his face, shaking his head and smiling at the Bills defender.
It was pretty clear that Kelce was taunting his opponent, but the referees did not throw a penalty flag – a pretty clear sign of special treatment for the star tight end.
“Travis Kelce has a special ability in the NFL where he is the only person who is allowed to taunt their opponent and not get a flag called!” one fan pointed out in a post on X, the social media website that was formerly known as Twitter.
Not only did the referees decline to throw a flag on Kelce for taunting, but they did throw a flag on Bills defensive tackle Jordan Phillips after he ran up to Kelce and head-butted him to break up his altercation with Hamlin.
As for the game itself, the Chiefs prevailed, punching their ticket to the Super Bowl for the third straight season.
