Does Taylor Swift really impact betting odds when she attends Chiefs games?

“We been on a winning streak.”

The Kansas City Chiefs are back on top and in form, and Taylor Swift was there to watch. The above lyric from her song “The Alchemy,” reportedly written about Travis Kelce, seems fitting. The pop star strutted into Arrowhead stadium bedazzled with glitter — just days after news dropped that she has surpassed Rihanna as the richest female musician in the world (net worth $1.6 billion) — and watched her boyfriend Kelce pull in nine catches for 70 yards in the Chiefs win. Oh, and one of her backup dancer’s brothers, New Orleans Saints defensive tackle Khalen Saunders, tackled Kelce and intercepted Patrick Mahomes in the end zone. It was an all-out Taylor Swift affair.

From a betting perspective, the Chiefs covered the 5.5-point spread and now sit at 5-0. Next up, a bye.

Not to quote Swift again, but, “Honestly, who are we to fight the alchemy?”

Taylor Swift has arrived at Arrowhead Stadium 🏈

🎥 @espn pic.twitter.com/wvr2CkLnZg

— The Athletic (@TheAthletic) October 7, 2024

This got me thinking, “Does that alchemy extend to the betting odds?”

Last season, Travis Kelce touched on it briefly.

In comments not important for Sunday’s game but might be for some folks, #Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce discusses the gambling impact of Taylor Swift attending Chiefs games. #ChiefsKingdom pic.twitter.com/6Iz4zTyyWX

— Nick Sloan (@NickSloanKCK) November 3, 2023

“When I mention if she’s going to be at the game, the Vegas line and over/under on my catches goes up and down, the spread goes up and down, so I’m just going to keep that to myself,” Kelce said to the media last season.

I know it’s a silly topic to some, but let’s have some fun and dig into the numbers on whether Swift’s attendance has any concrete impact on the Chiefs’ odds — or the public’s betting activity on Kansas City’s games.

Until Monday night, Swift hadn’t attended a Chiefs game since their last home game at Arrowhead in Week 2.

After last night’s win, the Chiefs are now 13-3 straight up and 10-5-1 against the spread in games that Swift attends.

For you non-Swifties out there, Taylor considers 13 a lucky number. She was born on December 13th, turned 13 on Friday the 13th, and threads the number through her songs and messages to fans. She also attended exactly 13 Chiefs games last year.

On the flip side, in games she didn’t attend, the Chiefs are 7-3 straight up and against the spread (going back to last season). So, when she attends, the Chiefs are better straight up and slightly worse against the spread, though there’s not much of a notable pattern there.

Has her beau done any better in the games she’s attended?

Last year, in 13 games that Swift attended, Kelce got a touchdown in four of them (two touchdowns in their playoff game against the Buffalo Bills). In games she didn’t attend, Kelce got a touchdown in two. This season, Kelce is yet to get on the touchdown board either way.

To dive in even further, we called in the experts.

“Swift doesn’t impact the odds or point spread when she is there,” said Thomas Gable, Director of Race and Sports at the Borgata (BetMGM operation in Atlantic City).

When it comes to prop bets on Kelce, though?

“We did see a slight increase in Kelce prop bets last season after she started dating him and attending games,” Gable explained. “And there was a small impact on the number of females who came in to make wagers on Kelce props. It was magnified throughout the playoffs and Super Bowl, when everything was at a fever pitch regarding their relationship and the attention it was garnering in the mainstream media.

“The Chiefs are going to remain one of the more publicly-bet teams simply because they’re really good and a consistent Super Bowl contender with the best quarterback in football on the team. So essentially, you’re taking an already popular team in terms of betting and trying to gauge if there is more interest on them because of Taylor. My estimation would be that it is extremely low to not at all in terms of betting handle impact on their games. But when it comes specifically to Kelce player props, we have seen an increase in interest.”

For you analytics junkies, we also asked our projections guy, Austin Mock, if he found any statistical correlations in Taylor’s attendance.

“She has no factor,” Mock replied laughingly. “No attendee at an NFL game will have any impact on the NFL betting market.”

Sorry, Swifties, it looks like her attendance doesn’t seem to make much of a difference in terms of betting, though that says nothing of her influence on the popularity of the team and the sport as a whole.

The vast majority of players included in The Athletic’s 2024 anonymous NFL player poll — 72.5 percent to be exact — said they viewed the pop star’s interest in the game (and the coverage that stemmed from it) as positive for the league.