The 2023-24 National Football League season has been another year filled with drama. On top of tons of twists and unexpected moments, the world never seems to hear enough of Travis Kelce and Taylor Swift’s relationship. This not only intrigued NFL fans to the situation, but also caused Swift’s fan base to find out every detail about the relationship and about the Kansas City Chiefs’ tight end.
Conveniently enough, Travis started a podcast in September 2022 called “New Heights” with his brother, Jason Kelce. Naturally, Swifties and NFL fans alike would tune into the podcast every week to see if they could find out some new information on the relationship, thus leading to Jason getting more recognition from the non-football world and becoming known as “Travis Kelce’s brother.”
Despite all the chaos of the Swift-Kelce relationship, Jason and the Philadelphia Eagles would start the year off with a bang. Out for revenge after their tragic Super Bowl loss against the Chiefs, the Eagles would go 10-1 through their first 11 games, beating extremely difficult opponents like the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Los Angeles Rams, Miami Dolphins, Dallas Cowboys, Kansas City Chiefs and Buffalo Bills. All these teams that would eventually go on to make the playoffs, four of which won in their divisions. Then out of nowhere, the Eagles would end the season going 1-6, with one of those losses coming in a blowout against the Buccaneers 32-9 that would knock them out of the playoffs in the first round.
Reports of Jason retiring had been rumored toward the end of the season, which would then come true after the wild card playoff loss where it was reported Jason told the team he would retire. “Rumored,” because it has been recently reported that these reports may not have been true, after Travis said that his brother “tstill got some football left.”
On X — formerly known as Twitter — the New Heights podcast account’s caption promoting the new episode said: “When the time is right, you’ll hear from the man himself.” New Heights has also been doing tremendously well, achieving the title of number one sports podcast on both Apple and Spotify.
However, regardless of the controversy surrounding Kelce’s possible retirement, what would it mean if he did? To start, Jason is a Super Bowl Champion, seven-time pro bowl selection and a six-time first-team All Pro selection. Kelce is also regarded as one of the best players ever at his position as a center. One of the reasons he is highly respected is due to the fact that he is always playing and almost never misses a game. So much so that he broke the Eagles’ franchise record with 145 consecutive starts on Oct.15. Jason has also started in all 193 games of his career.
The sixth round pick out of the University of Cincinnati has shown tremendous passion, glory and grit on and off the field, which is why he has had such a large influence over the years and has been looked up to at such a high degree.
Jason also came out talking about how he did not know what the future would hold for him, and how he does not like to live his life in absolutes.
Regardless of if Jason will retire or not, it seems he is still enjoying football, with pictures and videos surfacing the internet of him with his shirt off, beer in hand, screaming as he sees his younger brother Travis score in the divisional round of the NFL playoffs against the Bills. Shockingly, just hours before this matchup, it was reported that Travis may also retire at the end of this season alongside Jason.
Kelce has made an impact from his first career game until his potential last, and that is why all NFL fans admire him and why his potential retirement was such a big deal. Kelce’s presence will truly be missed from the game, with his career being looked on as truly one of the most influential.
