Jason Kelce has hinted he could hang up his cleats if the Philadelphia Eagles fail to get past the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in the NFL playoffs on Monday night.
Kelce, 36, is in the middle of his 13th season with the Eagles, the only team he has ever represented in his stellar NFL career.
The veteran center is looking to claim his second Super Bowl in the 2023 campaign, with his and Philadelphia’s only victory coming when they toppled the New England Patriots in 2017.
And ahead of their Wild Card Round showdown with the Bucs in Tampa, Kelce has teased the possibility of retirement as the Eagles’ postseason comes to a close.
Asked whether Monday’s match could be the last of his career, he refused to rule out retirement, saying: ‘As you get older in your career you never know when that will be.
Jason Kelce has hinted he could hang up his cleats if the Eagles fail to get past the Bucs
Kelce is at the end of his 13th NFL season and he has suggested it could be his last
“I try to remind guys that I did this, and my dad told me this from the time I started playing football: one day you step off the sidewalk and that could be the end of your career.
“So you try to approach every game with that mentality. But obviously the closer and older you get to that realization, it might become a little more prominent.
‘But that is of course not the most important thing. The most important thing is, you know, going out there and fighting with every one of the guys in this locker room.
“No matter how many years I or anyone else plays, this team only has one game left at this point and that’s what we’re really focused on.”
Kelce previously admitted he was considering retirement after losing last season’s Super Bowl to brother Travis and the Kansas City Chiefs, before announcing on Twitter (now X) in March that he’s “not done yet!”
But five months later, discussing his hectic NFL schedule, he said, “I think it’s a lot, and I think the way we’ve justified it as a family is that this (playing football) here will be over pretty quickly. If it is this year, which it very well could be, we want to make sure we are ready to go when the football is done.”
Jason’s life has changed dramatically since Travis started dating pop sensation Taylor Swift last year, significantly increasing his and his brother’s fame.
However, it has been reported that Swift has a testy relationship with the Eagles star and his wife Kylie.
Jason and his wife Kylie are said to be having a ‘difficult’ relationship with his brother Travis’s new girlfriend, Taylor Swift
Jason and Kylie are more reserved in the spotlight than Travis and his girlfriend
Travis’s brother Jason and his wife Kylie apparently haven’t made the singer feel too welcome and media comments about their relationship have upset Swift. according to Life and Style magazine.
In November, before Jason’s Philadelphia Eagles team played the Chiefs in Kansas City, Kylie Kelce gave an interview in which she said the spotlight “isn’t exactly my thing” and that she prefers to watch games from the stands rather than in the fancy suits from where she plays. Swift cheers on the Chiefs.
Swift has met Kelce’s parents — mom Donna and dad Ed — but so far there are no photos of her meeting Jason, who Travis is very close to, or Kylie.
Life and Style quoted a source as saying, “Taylor hasn’t had the best reception from Jason and his wife.”
Kylie’s quotes about the spotlight particularly irked Swift, with the source adding, “Taylor took that personally and it’s been very awkward ever since.”