Category: 49ers

Why 13 (personnel) has become the magic number for the Chiefs’ offense

The Kansas City Chiefs are better in 13 personnel than any other NFL team, and that could be big trouble for the 49ers in Super Bowl LVIII.

When you think of the Kansas City Chiefs’ offense, a “spread-’em-out” ideology may come to mind with multiple receivers, and perhaps Travis Kelce as the only tight end on the field. But that’s not what this offense was in 2022 under offensive coordinator Eric Bieniemy, and that’s not what this offense was in 2023, or is in 2024, under offensive coordinator Matt Nagy.

Quite the opposite, and it’s not been gradual, the Chiefs are now the kings of three-tight end sets. 13 personnel, with one back, three tight ends, and one receiver, has become the team’s primary formational constraint. This is clearly something that comes from on high, i.e., Andy Reid.

In the 2022 season, Kansas City led the league in passing out of 13 personnel, and they were ridiculously good at it. Patrick Mahomes had 74 dropbacks out of 13, completing 49 of 64 passes for 716 yards, 326 yards after the catch, nine touchdowns, no interceptions, and a passer rating of 152.1, which was just about dead solid perfect. Mahomes’ EPA throwing out of 13 was 31.95, which was absolutely preposterous — Geno Smith of the Seattle Seahawks ranked second at 12.36,

This season, Mahomes has also led the NFL in 13 personnel throws, though the results haven’t been quite as productive, which is a reflection of the entire Chiefs’ passing game. Mahomes has had 50 dropbacks out of 13, completing 28 of 44 passes for 380 yards, 188 yards after the catch, two touchdowns, two interceptions, a passer rating of 87.3, and an EPA of 1.81.

Where the Chiefs have upped their 13 personnel production this season is in the run game, and especially with second-year back Isiah Pacheco. Pacheco leads the NFL in 13 personnel carries with 53, gaining 226 yards, 140 yards after contact, and scoring one touchdown. Mahomes has also run eight times for 52 yards this season out of 13 personnel, so that’s something the San Francisco 49ers will want to consider in Super Bowl LVIII.

On Wednesday, I talked with Matt Nagy about the three-tight end sets, and why the Chiefs are the runaway leaders with all that. As Nagy said, the fact that they do it so much more than any other NFL teams is its own inherent advantage.

“Number one, we feel that we have a good set of tight ends who can do different things. When you’re in 13 personnel, are they receiving tight ends, or are they blocking tight ends, or are they both? We feel like we have a good mix there. So, it starts with personnel.

“The second part is, because there aren’t a lot of teams that do 13 personnel, a lot of defensive coordinators don’t have a lot of calls for 13 personnel. So, they’ve got kind of a limited menu  So now, you can do some different things. If a team shows a multitude of defenses against 13, we take a look at that and decide whether we want to go with it or not. We’ve been that way for a long time.”

Well, here’s the thing. The 49ers have faced three tight ends on just nine of their opponents’ passing attempts, with five catches allowed for 81 yards, one touchdown, no interceptions, and an opponent passer rating of 122.9.

The touchdown was a 31-yarder against the Seahawks in Week 14. The Seahawks motioned tight end Will Dissly across from left to right out of a wing alignment, and this was an interesting example of another way teams can use four-strong – to gain a favorable matchup for the iso receiver on the other side. With Dissly, Noah Fant, Colby Parkinson, and running back Kenneth Walker to the right, and with Fant and Parkinson then running intermediate crossers back over, DK Metcalf had an open one-on-one with cornerback Ambry Thomas as the backside iso. The 49ers could definitely see something like that on Sunday – also, one of the ways the Chiefs stress defenses with four-strong formations is to wind at least one of their tight ends back to the other side.

In the run game, the 49ers have faced rushing attempts out of 13 personnel just 13 times for 50 yards and a touchdown. The touchdown was a 16-yard Kareem Hunt run against the Cleveland Browns in Week 6. Cleveland motioned tight end Jordan Akins across from right to left, keeping David Njoku and Harrison Bryant on the right side. Receivers Donovan Peoples-Jones and David Bell were the ones who helped crack that run open for a 16-yard touchdown.

Based on what Nagy said regarding what defenses do (or do not do) against the Chiefs’ 13 personnel packages in the pass and run games, we should probably expect to see Kansas City to turn it all the way up to 13 in the Super Bowl.

In this week’s “Xs and Os with Greg Cosell and Doug Farrar,” the guys got into why the Chiefs’ 13 personnel stuff is so effective, and what the 49ers might want to try to work against it.

You can watch the “Xs and Os” Super Bowl Preview episode here:

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You can also listen and subscribe to the “Xs and Os” podcast on Spotify…

…and on Apple Podcasts.

It’s now or never for the San Francisco 49ers in Super Bowl LVIII

If not now, when? The clock is ticking for the San Francisco 49ers

Some of you will see the title of this piece and scoff. “Well no kidding it’s now or never, it’s the GD Super Bowl.”

Which, yes you would be right in that regard, but it’s not just a Super Bowl banner the 49ers are playing for, nor is it just the Kansas City Chiefs they are playing against. The 49ers are playing for something that solidifies this half-decade run they’ve gone on, and they are playing against the sands of time.

Walk with me, won’t you?

In the movie The Gray Man, Ryan Gosling’s character Six is a skilled assassin who works for the CIA. In a flashback scene, we are shown that he was tasked with keeping the niece of his boss safe. Like any action movie, a fleet of bad guys enter the home at night, and Six effortlessly subdues and executes all of them without making much of a peep. The young girl wakes up in the midst of it and asks Six if everything is okay, to which he replies with a confident and confiding smile “Just another Thursday.”

For the Chiefs, that’s what this week will be- just another Sunday. The last five years have been filled with long playoff runs and wins over the best the NFL has to over. They’ve played basically an entire other season worth of playoff games since the 2019 season, and are looking to win their third Super Bowl in five years after groggily sleepwalking their way to an 11-win season and their eighth consecutive AFC West title.

Even so, this felt like the season where Kansas City would finally have an early vacation and where we wouldn’t be seeing them play deep into January. Instead, though, they collectively drank their energy drinks around Week 17 and became the machine we all have grown to recognize (and maybe sort of detest). They ran through the Dolphins in the bitter cold without so much as breaking a sweat before continuing to be the perpetual knife in the side of Josh Allen and the Bills, defeating Buffalo in the playoffs for the third time. Then, by the third quarter of the AFC Championship Game, everyone in America outside of Missouri sat silently in their living rooms quietly muttering to themselves “They really f**king did it again” as they were hit with a Tom Brady and Bill Belichick-sized swarm of PTSD.

This isn’t even extravagant anymore for the Chiefs- it’s expected. But the 49ers? Their season was the total inverse.

While Kansas City was struggling to beat the Jets and losing to the Eagles and Packers in prime time, San Francisco was beating the Cowboys by four touchdowns. Philadelphia by three scores. They were going on the road and beating the Jaguars by 30 and putting up 30-40 points a week while on cruise control. Unlike the Chiefs though, the 49ers have stumbled over multiple hurdles in the postseason and were very lucky to even get this far.

Joe Barry’s defense mixed with a rain shower nearly proved to be the perfect concoction to end the 49ers’ season. Luckily for San Francisco, the Packers missed a field goal, failed a fourth down conversion early in the game, and Jordan Love went full Brett Favre on the final drive (NEVER go full Brett Favre).

Against Detroit, the Lions had the game won. They led by 17 at one point, but failure to capitalize on a fourth down conversion combined with the horrendous decision to go for it on another fourth down late in the game, as well as the swing in momentum as a result of said decisions, came back to haunt the Lions and the 49ers escaped with a win. The 49ers allowed 52 points across two games in the playoffs- the Chiefs allowed 41 in three games.

It’s needless to say that the Chiefs have been the better team when it matters most. But that brings me to the entire point of writing this in the first place. If you asked me who is going to win the Super Bowl, I’d tell you the Chiefs. If you asked me who needed to win more, the answer is undoubtedly the 49ers.

As already stated, this is familiar territory for the Chiefs. They basically have bottles of wine with their names on them and a table reserved for Super Bowl Sunday on a yearly basis. And while nothing is guaranteed in the NFL, Kansas city will without any shadow of a doubt be in this spot again as long as Patrick Mahomes is their quarterback and Andy Reid is their head coach.

The 49ers, and every other team not named the Chiefs for that matter, don’t have the luxury of all but knowing they’ll make it back. They’ve been close plenty of times, but haven’t won a Super Bowl since the 1994 season. They have 17 playoff wins since they last hoisted a Lombardi Trophy, and they have a lot of decisions to make over the next calendar year. This coming offseason, they are relatively light when it comes on players they’ll have to pay or let walk via free agency. Chase Young and Javon Kinlaw are the two biggest names in the bunch, with Randy Gregory also slated to hit the open market. 2025 though? Brandon Aiyuk, Talanoa Hufanga, Arik Armstead, Dre Greenlaw, and Charvarius Ward will all be free agents- you can’t pay all of them. Not to mention they’ll have to decide somewhere down the road how much they’ll pay Brock Purdy, which will bring it its own set of potential problems.

For as good as the 49ers have been over the last half-decade, all of it is for not if they can’t secure a ring. Oddly enough, it’s a spot that Kyle Shanahan’s opposition this Sunday knows far too much about, as Andy Reid’s Eagles went to five NFC Championship Games and one Super Bowl, but ended up empty-handed. And I’m sure throughout that entire run, a lot of Eagles fans were saying the same thing a lot of 49ers fans have been saying- “We’ll be back.” “We own the NFC.” “Who is a real threat in the conference?” Be careful with that line of thinking because there is no guarantee the 49ers will be back in this spot again.

For the Chiefs, this is nothing more than business as usual. A chance to add another piece of hardware to an already impressive collection while becoming a dynasty in the process. For the 49ers, it’s potentially the last chance to win a championship with this cast of stars before the last piece of sand falls to the bottom of the hourglass.

The Secret Superstars of Super Bowl LVIII

From Jauan Jennings to L’Jarius Sneed, here are 10 underrated players for the 49ers and Chiefs who could make all the difference in Super Bowl LVIII.

For every Super Bowl star you’d expect, there’s a player who comes out of nowhere in a relative sense to take over the biggest game of his life. That was just as true for Green Bay Packers receiver Max McGee in Super Bowl I as it was for Kansas City Chiefs running back Isiah Pacheco in Super Bowl LVII.

For the upcoming matchup between the Chiefs and the San Francisco 49ers in Super Bowl LVIII, we’d like to present 10 players — five from each team — whose deeds on the field have gone relatively unnoticed, but every one of them could be the one to take his team’s fortunes over the top.

Here are the Secret Superstars of Super Bowl LVIII.

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The Xs and Os with Greg Cosell: Previewing Super Bowl LVIII

It’s time for Super Bowl LVIII, which means that it’s time for Greg Cosell and Doug Farrar to dive into the Chiefs-49ers matchups with tape and advanced metrics.

It’s nearly time for the biggest game of the NFL season, which means it’s time for our guys Greg Cosell of NFL Films and ESPN’s NFL Matchup, and Doug Farrar of Touchdown Wire and the USA Today Sports Media Group, to do a very deep dive on Super Bowl LVIII between the Kansas City Chiefs and the San Francisco 49ers, using all kinds of tape study and advanced metrics.

Here, the guys cover these topics, as well as many others:

  • Why run defense for each team could be the key to the entire game, and why Chiefs running back Isiah Pacheco might unlock it all for Kansas City.
  • How Christian McCaffrey became the NFL’s best and most prolific zone runner.
  • How Steve Spagnuolo might blitz Brock Purdy, who has been amazing against the blitz all season.
  • Why Patrick Mahomes, who in the past has been similarly “unblitzable” in recent seasons, hasn’t been that in 2023.
  • Steve Wilks’ 49ers defense is far more multiple than some people think — especially in coverage — and why that could be a problem for Mr. Mahomes.
  • The Chiefs’ four-strong formations and use of 13 personnel, and how those two things have come to define Andy Reid’s offense to a great degree.
  • Why linebackers for both teams will be so important.
  • The Secret Superstars of Super Bowl LVIII.

You can watch this week’s “Xs and Os” right here:

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You can also listen and subscribe to the “Xs and Os” podcast on Spotify…

…and on Apple Podcasts.

 

Super Bowl LVIII features one of the best tight end battles in NFL history

Don’t forget to look out for two of the best tight ends to ever do it. Their play Sunday could decide the outcome.

There has been a lot of talk about the upcoming Super Bowl and the clash between future Hall of Famer Patrick Mahomes and Mr. Irrelevant Brock Purdy, and that is for good reason of course. There has also been much made about these two elite defenses who have in part carried these teams to the position they are in now. What hasn’t been quite as focused on is the chance to view two of the best tight ends to ever do it, shoulder the load on offense once again.

Yes, plenty of people have been talking about Kansas City Chiefs’ tight end Travis Kelce, but that has been for all the wrong reasons. Perhaps lost in the talk of Kelce’s social life is the serious reality that he is in the discussion for the greatest to ever do it at his position and is still playing at an elite level. On the other side if San Francisco 49ers’ tight end George Kittle, who while not as hyped up as Kelce, is still one of the best in the game and a major reason this 49ers offense is functional.

Kittle is used in such a variety of ways in the big brained offensive system of Kyle Shanahan and this 49ers offense. One of the majorly underappreciated portions of Kittle’s game is his blocking ability, sometimes being used almost as a swing tackle in the NFL’s best rushing attack. When asked to be a receiver Kittle is able to contribute as one of the league’s best yards after catch receiver, using elite levels of physicality to dominate opponents with the ball in his hands. Every 49ers playmaker can make plays post catch, Kittle is right there among the rest with his ability to take a dump off and make a huge play.

There isn’t much more that needs to be said about Kelce given his gentle reminder in the playoffs that he is an unstoppable machine. Kelce and Patrick Mahomes have such a unique connection and understanding of what is happening with the defense behind him that remains unmatched in history, and will certainly be a factor on the biggest stage once again.

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So while taking in all the lore and celebrity of the Super Bowl, don’t forget to appreciate the football history that is happening in front of us, and keep an eye on two of the best players to ever do it at the tight end position. Though they may make it hard to ignore them come Sunday.

4-Down Territory: Super Bowl LVIII Preview Edition!

In this week’s “4-Down Territory, Doug and Kyle get into all the Super Bowl LVIII particulars, and predict who will win.

Now that Super Bowl LVIII is set between the Kansas City Chiefs and the San Francisco 49ers, it’s time for Doug Farrar of Touchdown Wire, and Kyle Madson of Niners Wire, to get heavy into the biggest game of the season in  “4-Down Territory.”

This week, the guys have some serious questions to answer:

  1. What must the San Francisco 49ers do if they want to win this game?
  2. What must the Kansas City Chiefs do to take their third Lombardi Trophy in the last five seasons?
  3. Who will be the Secret Superstar in Super Bowl LVIII?
  4. Finally, who will win the game, and why?

You can watch this week’s “4-Down Territory” right here:

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You can also listen and subscribe to the “4-Down Territory” podcast on Spotify…

…and on Apple Podcasts.

Chiefs defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo might be Brock Purdy’s biggest fan

Brock Purdy’s biggest fan might not be with the 49ers. Chiefs defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo can’t stop talking about Purdy’s game.

LAS VEGAS — If you’re among the crowd that believes San Francisco 49ers quarterback Brock Purdy to be nothing but a game manager in a pejorative sense who needs everything around him to be perfect to make it work, don’t hang around Kansas City Chiefs defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo too long. Because Spags will bend your ear without provocation on the subject of Purdy, who he will of course face this Sunday in Super Bowl LVIII.

“Part of it is that he’s so poised,” Spagnuolo said on Monday’s Opening Night, when I asked him why Purdy has been so very good against the blitz this season. “I don’t think people give him enough credit for the talent he has. And then, he’s got all those weapons around him. I’ve been thoroughly impressed with what I’ve watched on tape over the last eight days. I’ve watched about every game now, and I don’t see the guy making very many mistakes.”

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I then asked Spagnuolo how important it is to hide one’s blitz intentions, and he took that as another opportunity to talk Purdy up.

“Yeah, you want to do that to a quarterback all the time. You don’t really want them to know you’re coming. You are trying to find ways to get free rushers. It doesn’t happen to him very often, and when it does, he’s got a really good knack for getting the ball out quickly. He gets the ball out before the receiver makes his break, and the timing they have is tremendous.”

Soon after that, the conversation turned to the mobility Purdy has shown in the playoffs with some important run plays –yes, he is “sneaky athletic.” And Spags was all over that concept.

“Anytime you’re playing a quarterback who’s as talented as he is, and can run the football, you have to make a lot of decisions. How many guys you commit to rushing the passer, and how many guys you commit to scrambling. We have a little bit of everything [to deal with], and we have to get him in those situations. First and second down, they do such a good job of running the ball, you have to get them into those passing situations.”

Asked a few minutes later about the 49ers’ offense in total… well, guess where Spags went in a big hurry?

“All the weapons they have, I mean, it’s multiple, right? We don’t have a lot of crossover from the AFC to the NFC, so I didn’t see them a lot. But I am thoroughly impressed with this quarterback. I don’t care where he came from, or what got him to this point. He’s the real deal. Not only throwing the ball, but you saw in these playoff games what he can do running the ball. And he’s as poised as I’ve seen at this early stage of his career.”

It’s been a highly interesting week of watching 49ers tape for Spagnuolo, and it’s quite clear that Purdy has been the focus. Even a specific question about running back Christian McCaffrey eventually got the ball rolling back to No. 13.

“The thing that impressed me is that I was expecting to turn on the film and see someone who looked like a backup quarterback, and had a weakness somewhere. But the timing of his throws, and the anticipation of his throws, are really impressive. And the fact that he can scramble like a really good athlete – I was really impressed with that. I didn’t know that about him. He seems like a really experienced quarterback who’s been doing it for a long time. I often try to watch the broadcast views and not just the coach’s tape. You know how those cameras can get really close [on the quarterback’s face] and he never gets rattled. He always looks poised, and it’s really impressive.”

Not that Spags in unaware of Kyle Shanahan’s other weapons, and how they’ll be deployed. But this is a clear indicator that whatever negative impressions people outside the league may have of Purdy at this point in his career… well, those views are not shared by the guys who have to devise schemes to go against him.

Why “four-strong” has become the perfect equation for Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs

Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs are wizards at breaking defenses with four-strong receiver routes. Here’s what the 49ers will deal with.

LAS VEGAS — The Kansas City Chiefs’ offense hasn’t been aligned to its optimal outcome all season long, but one thing that’s worked all the way is their 3×1 receiver alignments. Patrick Mahomes is brilliant at reading defenders put in conflict with the route concepts out of trips and bunch sets. This season, including the playoffs, Mahomes has 28 explosive passes out of 3×1 sets, averaging 31.4 yards per play, and 4.8 yards of separation per play to the intended receiver. No matter the coverage or pressure, the Chiefs create all kinds of havoc in those 3×1 sets.

Those results are further magnified when the call is to send a back or a fourth receiver into the area where the three bunched receivers are. Then, opposing defenses are dealing with Andy Reid’s “four-strong” concepts, and the numbers game rarely, if ever, favors the defense.

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For examples, let’s begin with Mahomes’ 21-yard completion to Travis Kelce with 43 seconds left in the first half of the AFC Championship game against the Baltimore Ravens. This was against Cover-3, with linebacker Roquan Smith dropping from a nose-shade alignment to bump Justin Watson on his post. Cornerback Ronald Darby bailed Marquez Valdes-Scantling outside, and that left Kyle Hamilton as the unfortunate guy to deal with the negative effects of the four-on-three advantage in the Chiefs’ favor. Hamilton’s focus was split between Clyde Edwards-Helaire’s flat route, and Travis Kelce’s corner route. When Hamilton bit on Edwards-Helaire underneath, Mahomes had the easy completion to Kelce up top.

The Chiefs aren’t just about getting to four-strong from one side, through — they can also motion and roll into it in other ways. On this 45-yard pass from Mahomes to receiver Richie James against the Las Vegas Raiders in Week 16, James and Travis Kelce ran matching 15-yard in-cuts, Marquez Valdes-Scantling ran a vertical route up the mean, and Rashee Rice worked the shallow cross from left to right. Rice occupied linebacker Robert Spillane and slot defender Nate Hobbs in the Raiders’ Cover-4, while Kelce took cornerback Amik Robertson and safety Trevon Moehrig over the top. With all that clearance, it was James against cornerback Jonathan Jones outside right. Jones was playing bail coverage to the boundary, and he kept going vertical when James cut inside, and he had a cow pasture of open field after the catch.

This is a great way to work into a Dagger concept against two-deep coverage.

This 27-yard pass to Justin Watson against the Denver Broncos in Week 8 was four-strong with yet another different flavor — and another way to defeat two-deep coverage. Here, the Chiefs were in a 3×1 set with Watson motioning to trips right. That motion put Denver’s Cover-2 coverage in a problem spot, with Watson getting wiiiiiiide open on the corner route. Cornerback Damarri Mathis probably would have preferred that Watson stay outside. Mahomes could have also hit Jerick McKinnon on the release route from the backfield for a big gain.

It’s really tough to beat four-strong, but 49ers defensive coordinator Steve Wilks is aware of the challenge, and he has a few ideas. For one thing, you can sit in zones and wait for Mahomes to pick you apart by reading the defender in conflict as he did with Kyle Hamilton. That’s one example of those ad-lib routes Kelce and Mahomes do so well because their communication is just about psychic at this point. Then, as Wilks said last week, you’ve got to keep your guys on their guys.

“We still have to have a great plan. We’ve still got to execute and finish. When they start to ad-lib we’ve got to do a great job of really plastering the man within our zone and really straining to make sure we finish the rep.”

Easier in theory than in practice, and don’t be surprised if, in the most important game of the year, Andy Reid busts out four-strong in more ways than one.

How Steve Wilks’ 49ers defense can put a lid on Patrick Mahomes

If the 49ers are going to put a lid on Patrick Mahomes in Super Bowl LVIII, defensive coordinator Steve Wilks will have to open his entire playbook.

The Kansas City Chiefs are back in the Super Bowl — for the fourth time in the last five seasons — and Patrick Mahomes is getting hot at exactly the right time. Mahomes’ 2023 regular season, affected as it was by some iffy receivers and a questionable playbook at times, was underwhelming. But in his two playoff games, Mahomes has completed 47 of 62 passes (75.8% completion rate) for 456 yards (7.4 yards per attempt), three touchdowns, no interceptions, and a passer rating of 112.0.

If the San Francisco 49ers are to avenge their 31-20 loss to the Chiefs in  Super Bowl LIV four years ago, they’ll have to do as much as possible to contain Mahomes both as a passer and as a second-reaction runner. Defensive coordinator Steve Wilks is well aware.

“Well, it is definitely a challenge,” Wilks said Friday of the Mahomes Factor.  “Not only him, you look at [Travis] Kelce, you talk about two first-ballot Hall of Famers there. We definitely have to prepare and be ready. It’s different things that we have to do. Number one, he’s doing a tremendous job, really extended plays. We talked all week. It’s two plays within one down. When the ball snaps and then once he starts to scramble. So he’s phenomenal. The best I’ve ever seen for just buying time, winning with his feet, and getting the ball where it needs to go down the field.

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“They do ad-lib and they do a great job of it. But we still have to have a great plan. We’ve still got to execute and finish. When they start to ad-lib we’ve got to do a great job of really plastering the man within our zone and really straining to make sure we finish the rep.”

Putting a lid on Patrick Mahomes when he’s on is one of the toughest things to do in sports, but the 49ers under Wilks do have some concepts that they execute very well, which could get them started down the right path. Some are obvious, and some seem quite counterintuitive, but here’s what the 49ers have done this season, and what Mahomes would prefer they not do, that could make a serious difference in Super Bowl LVIII.

Embassy of Japan is confident that Taylor Swift can attend Super Bowl LVIII after tour date

The Embassy of Japan gave Taylor Swift fans some reassurance regarding Swift’s ability to attend Super Bowl LVIII to see Travis Kelce in action.

Forget the matchups in Super Bowl LVIII between the Kansas City Chiefs and the San Francisco 49ers — the real question everybody wants answered is whether Taylor Swift will be at the big game in Las Vegas.

There is some drama here, as Swift’s “New Eras” tour closes its Japanese run at the Tokyo Dome on Saturday, February 10. The show starts at 6:00 p.m. Tokyo time, and if Swift’s show ends at 10:00 or 11:00 Tokyo time, it’ll be a tight fit to get her to the game on time to see her guy Travis Kelce.

Of course, Swift can avail herself of any transportation scenario, and she’ll be 14 hours ahead of Eastern Standard Time (Las Vegas is in the Pacific Time Zone), so that’s a break. The game kicks off at 6:30 p.m. EST on Sunday.

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Recently, the Twitter feed for the Embassy of Japan offered some comfort for those who won’t see the Super Bowl the same without Swift’s presence.

So, we’ve moved from probable to likely, which is nice.