Haters gonna hate (hate, hate, hate, hate),I and my love Travis Kelce don’t care about public opinion

The sight of Taylor Swift cheering on rumored beau Travis Kelce (alongside his mother) at the star tight end’s Kansas City Chiefs-Chicago Bears game last week created such a pop-culture earthquake, it even moved legendary coach Bill Belichick to … gasp … make a joke. On “The Greg Hill Show,” he said, “Well, I would say that Travis Kelce’s had a lot of big catches in his career. This would be the biggest.”

With Swift not scheduled to resume her Eras tour until Oct. 18 in Miami, the singer was reportedly seen in New York City this weekend and attended Sunday’s game between Kelce’s Chiefs and the New York Jets at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, N.J. An appearance would no doubt add fuel to the curiosity about the relationship, bringing joy to many but irking others, especially conservatives who have no love for Swift or Kelce.

The gravitational waves of Swift’s influence can be detected in sacred signs such as jersey sales (Kelce’s shot into the NFL’s Top 5 and his merchandise sales increased by 400% after last Sunday’s game), ticket sales — for the Chiefs, not Swift (StubHub reported a jump of nearly 300%), and the most holy of holies, Instagram followers (social media and branding agency bknown says the All-Pro tight end gained more than 860,000).

Longtime NFL reporter Adam Schefter posted on the platform formerly known as Twitter that that figure represented gaining more followers “than he did following all three Super Bowls he played in combined.” The next-biggest NFL gainer last week? Travis’ brother Jason Kelce (137,000 added). Travis and Jason host the podcast “New Heights,” which also gained a considerable boost.