Just days after Kansas City Chiefs star Travis Kelce won another Super Bowl, his older brother, Jason, told his sibling that he “crossed the line” when he bumped into his head coach Andy Reid in middle of the game.
Jason Kelce, who himself won a Super Bowl with the Philadelphia Eagles six years ago, said his brother’s behavior was “not acceptable” during a new episode of the “New Heights” – the podcast the pair do together.
“You crossed the line,” said Jason, who told teammates last month that he plans on retiring. “I think we can both agree on that.”
Travis agreed, saying: “I can’t get that fired up to the point where I’m bumping coach and it’s getting him off balance and stuff. When he stumbled, I was just like, ‘Oh s—‘ in my head.”
Jason continued, saying the “yelling in his face” was “over the top.”
“I think there are better ways to handle this, retrospectively,” he added.
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Travis said he’s a “passionate guy” and expressed his admiration for his 65-year-old coach, who’s been leading the Chiefs for the past 11 seasons.
“I love coach Reid, and coach Reid knows how much I love to play for him and how much I love to be a product of his coaching career,” Travis said. “I’m not playing for anybody else but Big Red. If he calls it quits this year, I’m out there with him, man.”
“It came at a moment where we weren’t playing very well,” added Travis, who also apologized for the incident.
During Super Bowl LVIII, the Chiefs player was seen aggressively yelling at his coach and making physical contact with him – causing Reid to nearly lose his balance. It happened after Chiefs running back Isiah Pacheco fumbled the ball near the endzone in the second quarter of the game. Kelce was on the sidelines for that play.
The coach said in postgame that Travis caught him “off balance” and the contact was worse than it looked because he didn’t see him coming.
“The part I love is he loves to play the game and he wants to help his team win,” Reid said. “It’s not a selfish thing. That’s not what it is. I understand that. As much as he bumps into me, I get after him and we understand that.”
The moment proved to be a moot point during the team’s thrilling 25-22 win in overtime. Mecole Hardman Jr., the Chiefs wide receiver who caught the game-winning touchdown, credited Kelce’s halftime speech with the team’s second half turnaround after being down 10-3 to the San Francisco 49ers.
“He set the fire on everybody,” Hardman said Monday on “CBS Mornings.” “He flipped a few things over, but he definitely had a good speech to get everyone going and definitely got fuel to the fire, and we came out to the second half doing better than we did in the first half.”
