Why NFL Stars Like Travis Kelce, Josh Allen, Patrick Mahomes & More Love Golf

NFL players will spend the next four months getting and taking hits. Maybe that’s why so many of them enjoy spending so much time – in the offseason or during bye weeks – playing golf. It’s so, so much safer and far more peaceful.

Patrick Mahomes, the star quarterback for the Kansas City Chiefs, knows that feeling of serenity golf brings. He started playing with his dad, Patrick Mahomes Sr., when he was a kid and now golf is a competitive outlet for the 3-time Super Bowl Champion... but also, a place of peace.

“Golf has become a huge part of everything,” Mahomes told GOLF in 2021. “When I plan trips, when I set up my off-season, I have to figure out places to play when I’m there. I’ve got this love for golf because I have to get better, and I compete, but it’s also somewhere I can relax and have an awesome time.”

Before they became two of the most famous podcast hosts on the planet, Jason Kelce was a Super Bowl champion with the Philadelphia Eagles and Travis Kelce earned a few rings alongside Mahomes with the Kansas City Chiefs. Travis Kelce is also the world’s most recognizable fiancée.

So while they have titles and are likely headed toward busts in Canton, they really are just like you and me: They are golf addicts.

While Travis Kelce suggests he just heads to the course and lets it fly, his brother, Jason, takes the same approach to getting ready for a par-5 as he did making sure he was in the right spot to block on a bubble screen.

“That's what makes him so great at everything,” Travis Kelce said earlier this year at the American Century Championship. “He grinds it out. I like to kind of wing it left and right and see if I can figure something out on the greens. But Jason is just a hard worker. He's going to figure it out.”

If it’ll help him improve, Jason Kelce will take tips from anyone. Even the internet.

The Kelces aren’t the only ones obsessed with golf. Buffalo Bills quarterback Josh Allen, who was last year’s NFL MVP, regularly plays in the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am. He was spotted at the Masters this past April.

“I obviously got into golf watching Tiger [Woods] as a kid,” Allen said during one of his stops along the Monterrey Peninsula. “Any time you saw on the ESPN ticker that he was in contention, you turn it on. Then my dad and mom would take me and brother out every once in a while. Then I got into the league and had a little time in the offseason and I needed to do something, and golf is what I chose. No turning back now; I’m obsessed.”

Perhaps no football player, past or present, has put as much time into golf as former Dallas Cowboys quarterback and current CBS analyst Tony Romo. He is a multiple-time winner of the American Century Championship. He received a sponsor’s exemption into the 2019 AT&T Byron Nelson. He’s attempted to qualify for the U.S. Open a host of times.

“I find that I'm slightly obsessed sometimes,” Romo said at the Invited Celebrity Classic in 2024. “In football, you threw a ball every day, you got better. You figure things out, and then eventually something clicks and you know it. In golf, it's like you've got it, but then that doesn't work or it doesn't feel the same way.”

Yes, Tony Romo, a four-time Pro Bowler who threw for more than 34,000 yards, is always looking for answers. He also has found himself with some awkward lies.

But all it takes is one good shot, whether you are a weekend hacker or an NFL star, and you’re hooked.

“I think you start to hit shots and you hit your first flush shots, and that kind of starts to grab you,” Romo said in 2023. “I had other responsibilities and stuff throughout my life, but I knew that when I was done playing I would like to try and improve and attack it. It's taken a while, but slowly I was able to come out and do something decent to get us here.”