Why Eagles' Jason Kelce, City of Brotherly Love Were Perfect Fit

Philadelphia Eagles center Jason Kelce's connection to Philly was destined from the start, from the brotherly love shared between him and his brother to his speech in a Mummer's costume, and more.

PHILADELPHIA – He grew up in Ohio in the Cleveland suburb of Cleveland Heights, but Jason Kelce belongs to Philadelphia now.

It doesn’t matter that Kelce retired on Monday in what was a very emotional speech that didn’t leave many eyes dry inside the auditorium at the Eagles’ NovaCare Complex after all 13 of his years in the NFL spent as a member of the Philadelphia Eagles.

He will always be Philadelphia through and through. And, like a favorite pair of jeans or those comfortable shoes, Kelce and the City of Brotherly Love were a perfect fit, and that was reflected three ways in Kelce’s 42-minute address.

Philly was his destiny from the start. Here's why:

BROTHERLY LOVE

Travis Kelce was there to support his big brother. Wearing a dark pair of sunglasses to mask his myriad emotions as his big brother spoke, Travis sat in the front row with his mom, Donna, his dad, Ed, and sister-in-law, Jason’s wife, Kylie.

Kelce had a difficult time making it through the part of his speech about Travis, having to stop several times to collect his emotions. He said they came from a small family – no cousins, one aunt, one uncle.

Travis Kelce and his older brother Jason Kelce share a moment after Jason announced his retirement from the NFL on March 4, 2024 :: Ed Kracz/SI Eagles Today

“It was really my brother and I our whole lives,” he said. “We did almost everything together – competed, fought, laughed, cried, and learned from each other.”

The Kelce brothers invented games and played outside, picturing themselves as star players in whatever games they played.

“We won countless Super Bowls in our minds before ever leaving the house,” said Jason. “There’s no chance that I’d be here without the bond Travis and I share. It made me stronger, tougher, smarter, and taught me the values of cooperation, loyalty, patience, and understanding.

“It’s only too poetic that I found my career being fulfilled in the City of Brotherly Love. I knew that relationship all too well.”

ROXBORO

OK, it’s spelled differently than the section of Philadelphia known as Roxborough, but how telling is it that he began playing football at a school named after a Philly neighborhood? In Ohio?

It was with a story from Roxboro where Kelce began his retirement speech.

He remembered a teammate’s name (Anthony) from a drill where both players, fully padded, lay flat on their backs waiting for the whistle to blow, at which time they would plow into each other to see who could remain upright.

He talked about the weight of his helmet and shoulder pads weighing him down, making him feel unbalanced.

“As the whistle blew, I rose, turned all in one motion, and ran to my teammate,” he said. It isn’t even the collision I remember most, but the feeling before of what in the (bleep) is about to happen. How is it going to feel? Will I win?”

So began his love affair with football – at Roxboro MS.

“Stepping on the field is the most alive and free I ever felt,” he said. “Here was a visceral feeling with football, unlike any other sport. The hairs on my arms would stand up. I could hit somebody, run around like a crazed lunatic then get told, 'Good job.'

“I loved football, whether it was in the backyard with my brother, on the playground with my friends, or suiting up on Friday nights at Cleveland Heights High School, I loved everything about it.”

MUMMER

He wore a Mummer’s costume for his speech made at the Eagles Super Bowl parade in 2018.

The Mummers are uniquely Philadelphia, and it is what he said and what he wore that day that will resonate forever in a city that will never forget its first Super Bowl title. No matter how many more they may go on to win, it will always be the first that is never forgotten.

Nor will Kelce. Or that speech. Epic.

It wasn’t his, he said. It belonged to Philadelphia. 

'From the Bottom of My Heart': Jason Kelce's Emotional Goodbye

He always understood this city and here he was showing it, proving it to the million or so who turned out for the championship parade and the countless others who watched it on TV on that cloudless February day six years ago.

“I won’t forget the parade and what it meant to the city of Philadelphia,” he said. “The joy it brought to our community, and the closure that it gave to so many.”

He recalled the stories he was told along the route from the Eagle’s South Philly stadium to Center City and the steps of the Philadelphia Museum of Art.

“The stories from fans that have been waiting generations for that moment, (to take) that triumph to another level,” he said. “On that (parade) route, I remember meeting a woman (who brought) ashes of a dead relative, who she had promised wouldn’t miss the parade if the Eagles had ever won.

“The speech that had written itself and one that had symbolized what we all lived as players, as a team, and as a city? That wasn’t my speech. That was Philadelphia’s”