Jason Kelce and Travis Kelce have an enviable sibling bond full of support, laughter and, of course, football.
As the brothers have found success in the NFL, they have shared glimpses of their relationship off the field. Their family even served as inspiration for Travis’ Saturday Night Live monologue, which he hosted for the first time in February 2023.
“Jason and I have actually been playing football together since we were little kids and he was always better than me — at everything,” Travis quipped of his older brother. “In high school, he was an honor student and I got kicked off the team because I failed French. And then, when we were in college, I actually got kicked off the team because I tested positive for marijuana.”
Both Jason and Travis played football at the University of Cincinnati, overlapping for two years. Travis was let go from the squad in 2010 after random drug testing before Jason advocated for his reinstatement.
“He could have killed me but he was very bit of a mentor in those moments, man,” Travis recalled in his brother’s Kelce documentary, which dropped on Prime Video in September 2023. “Along the way, there was some tough brother s—t that I just had to hear and I knew my brother had gone to the coaches and said, ‘You know, if you give him a second chance, he won’t screw up.’ It kind of put his word on the line. … Without that guy, I don’t know where [or] what I would be doing.”
Jason noted that his “role” was to do “the same thing my parents did in a time of adversity,” which was to support Travis. “My job is to be there to fulfill that same belief and confidence in him,” the Philadelphia Eagles center added.
Keep reading for all of Travis and Jason’s best and most heartwarming quotes about their sibling bond:
The Final Fight
“Jason tells a great story of our last actual fist fight, where he punched me in the face after playing a game of basketball. I had finally got to the point where I was looking him eye-to-eye in high school,” Travis said on the “Manningcast” show in November 2022. “I picked him up and threw him onto the kitchen floor and knocked the stove off its hinges and everything. We got yelled at by mom [Donna Kelce] and almost injured dad [Ed Kelce] in the midst of it all. That’s what ended up breaking up the fight — we almost hurt my dad and sent him to the hospital. That was the end of us fighting.”
The “Kelce Legacy” in the NFL
When Travis was drafted by the Kansas City Chiefs in 2013, he picked a jersey number with a special meaning.
“I love you, you’re the only reason I wear 87,” Travis told his brother in February 2023 in front of reporters, referring to Jason’s birth year of 1987. “I never told you that, man. You started the legacy.”
He later added: “If there is a Kelce legacy [of] two brothers making it to the NFL, it all started in 1987 because this big guy was born in 1987.”
The Kelce Bowl
Jason and Travis became the first brothers to face off in the Super Bowl in February 2023, which Travis’ team won.
“Congratulations, go celebrate,” Jason told his sibling after the game, embracing in a sweet hug. “I love you too. Go celebrate.”
A Saturday Night to Remember
Fresh off Travis’ second Super Bowl victory, he got the call to host SNL later that month.
“The coolest thing about this Super Bowl was that my whole family was there. I got to play against my brother Jason, who is an Eagle, and my mom was on TV more than both of us,” he joked in his monologue about his family. “My mom, dad and brother are all here tonight.”
He continued: “You know, people keep asking me what it was like to beat my brother in the Super Bowl. And, um, it was pretty awkward especially because after the game we had to ride home together. Our mom drove us there in her minivan. Even though his team lost after being up 10 points at half, my brother is actually really happy for me.”
They Always Have Each Other’s Back
“I’m forever in debt to this guy for putting his name, our name — the Kelce name — on the line. When I say I owe it all to him, I really do,” Travis said on the “Bussin’ With The Boys” podcast in June 2023 about Jason talking to multiple college football coaches about his reinstatement.
“Uncle Travvy” Has Endless Energy
Jason and his wife, Kylie Kelce, share three daughters — Wyatt, Elliotte and Bennett — who’ve become big fans of their Uncle Travis.
“Travis just has such a zest and virality for life,” Jason told E! News in September 2023. “My daughters, they’re so drawn to him immediately — partly because he’s gorgeous, but then also he’s just a fun human being. He’s exciting. He has energy for days. He’ll get down on the floor and he’ll crawl into a dollhouse. He does whatever they want.”
Little Brother Syndrome
“Jason is two years older than me, so he always kind of had the upper hand,” Travis teased in the Kelce documentary. “That was everything for me as a kid … to be able to beat Jason at something.”
The Reason Behind the Podcast
“You know, my brother and I really — a lot of times — we don’t talk that much during the season ‘cause we get caught up doing our own thing,” Jason said in Kelce about starting their joint “New Heights” podcast, which Travis added was launched for them to “have fun together” in the middle of the NFL season.
Jason and Travis launched their podcast, titled after their hometown of Cleveland Heights, to discuss their lives and football highlights of the week.
A ‘Better’ Brother
“Trav is so good [and] he’s obviously the better football player,” Jason gushed during an NFL on NBC sitdown in October 2023. “He’s a special person and his personality, the way he carries himself, he’s fun to be around, he’s smart … and he’s just a good-intentioned human being. I wish, in a lot of ways, I was more similar to Trav.”
‘Safety’ First
Travis started dating pop star Taylor Swift in September 2023, with Jason often teasing his brother about his love life. Despite cracking jokes about the high-profile romance, Jason puts Travis’ happiness and well-being over all else.
“It’s certainly been weird, the level that it is now,” Jason told NBC Sports one month later. “On one hand, I’m happy for my brother that he seems to be in a relationship that he’s excited about [and] that he is genuine about. But there’s another end of it where it’s like, ‘Man, this is a lot.’ … There’s some alarms, sometimes, with how over-in-pursuit people can be. Overall, he can deal with some of this. As long as it’s not becoming a threat to his safety and things like that.”
A Competitive Edge
Ahead of Travis and Jason’s November 2023 rematch following Super Bowl LVII, Jason was asked in a pregame press conference about the possibility of the Eagles winning over the Chiefs.
“I’ve beat [Travis] enough in his life that I think I’ll still be happy. I got a lot of them,” Jason quipped to reporters. “It would be nice to get a win under the Eagles’ belt. There’s two teams, not just him. You know, we haven’t beat the [Seattle] Seahawks either. Those are two teams I’ve never been fortunate to get a victory against, but as with every week … you really focus on, ‘What do we need to do?’”
