Travis Kelce is approaching history. And not just for tight ends.

Examining all-time milestones the Chiefs tight end is starting to reach, putting him in uncharted territory.

Every now and then one must stop, as they say, and smell the roses. Or take the time to appreciate a Hall of Famer creating a legacy unlike any we’ve ever seen (I’ve heard the expression both ways).

We need to take a second to talk about Travis Kelce. Because amidst all the ridiculous attempts that have been made to brush off the Chiefs’ tight end’s unique dominance at his position (wrongheaded comments about his blocking, which we’ve addressed here previously, or ridiculous statements about his running after the catch), he’s doing things that have never been done in the league before by a tight end. And really, at this point it’s not particularly close.

Kelce’s statistical dominance of his position is the sort of thing that has been taken for granted over the last several years as he’s distanced himself from other all-time greats in terms of thousand-yard seasons (we’ll get to the numbers shortly). It’s a fascinating thing to see in real time; People just shrugging off a player totally separating from the pack in terms of production, or not realizing just how different what we’re witnessing is from anything else in NFL history.

Tight ends aren’t supposed to move like this. They’re not supposed to be able to get separation at the line using anything other than brute force. They’re not supposed to use subtle fakes and hips to get defenders moving the wrong way only to leave them humiliated in the end zone.

(That might be my favorite picture ever of Kelce, by the way. Everything about it is perfect)

So today, we’re going out of our way to NOT shrug off what Kelce is doing and how unique it is. I’ll talk a bit about what makes him great (just for fun), but mostly we’re just here to ensure that we don’t blink and miss a one-of-a-kind player providing one-of-a-kind production. And he’s fast approaching a place where the caveat of “for a tight end” regarding his production no longer applies, as he closes in on receiving numbers that only Hall of Fame wide receivers (and not all of those) can match.