KANSAS CITY, Mo. — The focus of the NFL scouting combine is the looming draft and the flood of college prospects who will comprise it. It’s a head start on a free-agency window that opens in a couple of weeks. It’s the chance to finalize an ideal blueprint for the next couple of months.

Or, more simply, the focus of the combine is the future.

But as Chiefs general manager Brett Veach navigated the car wash of media points this week here in Indianapolis, the focus of his interviews remained on a player who has defined the past.

Travis Kelce.

Will the 36-year-old tight end be part of the future?

“I think we’ve kind of taken a different approach with Travis — in the sense that we’ve prepared for either scenario,” Veach responded, adding once, twice and then three times that the Chiefs have had dialogue with Kelce and his reps as he mulls a decision about whether to return for a 14th season in the NFL.

That sounds familiar to what we heard a year ago.

It’s not. Well, not completely, anyway.

Last year, the conversation about Travis Kelce’s future required just one question: Will he be back?

This year, the conversation is far more expansive. Will he be back? And, if so, at what price? And, if they find an agreeable price, what priority will Kelce have in an offense that needs to improve?

The reverberations pivot on whether Kelce wants to still play. And that might pivot on whether he has the desire to put in the kind of work that prompted a bounce-back season at age 36. Kelce turns 37 in October.

Veach’s classification of the current circumstances — the ongoing dialogue that Chiefs head coach Andy Reid also mentioned this week — implies Kelce must at least be considering coming back.

But there’s a lot more to consider afterward this year. That price, for starters.

Kelce is a free agent after the expiration of a two-year, $34 million contract he signed in April 2024. He was underpaid during the prime of his career, which might sound backwards for someone who spent the majority of those years hugging the top of the tight end pay scale.

But his position’s market didn’t really explode while Kelce was in his prime, because Kelce was the best at the position, and his contract didn’t blow up. It didn’t come close to the neighborhood of what top receivers were paid, even though Kelce operated as the Chiefs’ No. 1 receiver eight times in his career, including six of the last seven seasons.

The higher payments have come more recently. Kelce occupied 6.7% of the salary cap in 2023, 7.7% of the cap in 2024 and 6.9% of the cap in 2025. Those are the three highest numbers of Kelce’s career.

It would be tough for the Chiefs to make it a fourth.

It should go without saying that Kelce is good for business, both on the field and as part of the brand. But the Chiefs remain in the red in relation to the salary cap, at least until they likely cut right tackle Jawaan Taylor.

They simply have too much work to do — too many other needs to address — to allocate 6.7-7.7% of the salary cap to a 37-year-old at any non-quarterback position, even if it’s the best receiver in the organization’s history.

Which brings up the other reverberation. It would be ideal if the man who has been the best receiver in the organization’s history wasn’t still that organization’s best receiver in 2026.

While the Chiefs are preparing for two different scenarios — one with Kelce returning and one without — those separate objectives need to include at least one similarity:

They should try to find Patrick Mahomes a new No. 1 option — or at least something resembling it.

There is a reason Kelce is contemplating his future — or whether that future includes playing football at all. It’s becoming more and more difficult to play at the level that will earn him a Hall of Fame jacket.

No tight end in NFL history has put up 1,000 yards in his age-37 season or later. Only one wide receiver has done it, and you might have heard of him: Jerry Rice.

Kelce will be better than other 37-year-old tight ends. He actually put up the second-best season ever for a 36-year-old tight end in 2025. But he won’t be better than Travis Kelce at age 30.

Kelce leading the team in receptions, yards and touchdowns a year ago is a terrific personal accomplishment — but a less-than-ideal reality for the team.

The Chiefs have tried to turn receiver Rashee Rice into the focal point, but he’s played in 12 of a possible 37 games over the last two seasons. And he’s entering the final year of his rookie contract.

It’s yet one more direction to which you might be inclined to point as you analyze what the Chiefs will do with the No. 9 pick, their best draft pick in more than a decade. Ohio State’s Carnell Tate would be an intriguing talent. Others, too.

Someway, somehow, the position ought to be among the considerations.

That’s why the Chiefs are here in Indianapolis — to contemplate the future.

Even as they wait to see if Kelce puts football in his past.

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